“We have had in this extraordinary journey by river all the terrors as well as pleasures of river life. We now glide down narrow streams, between palmy and spicy islands, whose sweet fragrance and vernal colour causes us to forget at moments our dangerous life. We have before us the winding shores of islands crowned with eternal spring- life and verdure. Teak and cotton-wood, the hyphene, borassus, wild date, and Guinea oil-palms, the tall serpent-like rattan, with its pretty, drooping feathery leaves; the bushy and many-rooted mangrove, the towering gum, the shea-butter tree, the _Ficus kotschyana_, the branchy _Tamar indica_, with an undergrowth of extraordinary variety. Along the banks, especially wherever there is a quiet nook, thrive dense growths of the _Arundo phragmites_ grass, whose long, bright green leaves we hear rustle as we glide by before the breeze blowing up river; here and there the _Papyrus antiquorum_, or a specimen of the _Edemone mirabilis_, or Eschinomenæ. In the calm tepid waters of the little creeks that wind in mazy curves between low islands a wonderful variety of aquatic plants is discovered; various species of Nymphæa, with white or lavender-coloured flowers, and, woven with their slender stalks, the broad-leafed Vallisneria, and amongst them, modest and of a pretty green, the rosette-shaped _Pistia stratiotes_. In thick hedges bordering either side of the creeks are vigorous growths of ever-fresh-looking ferns.