been formed; and there is here an excellent library of
books, on nearly all subjects. A collection of economic
products is in course of formation, and if well carried
out, will add much to the interest of the place. The
Botanical Gardens are situated at Tanglin, a distance of
about three miles from the town of Singapore; and as
the roads are smooth and level, it is a very pleasant
journey, either in the morning or evening. One night
each week the military band performs in the garden;
and then a good many of the residents ride or drive
out to “ eat the air,” and hear the music before dinner.
Good collections of orchids, palms, and economic plants,
are here kept up, and the place forms an agreeable
promenade morning and evening. In addition to the
plants, a small collection of animals and birds, for the
most part natives of the Archipelago, may be seen here.
The island itself is tolerably flat, the elevated portions
being in the form of low hills, or “ bukits,” the highest,
Bukit Timah, being about 400 feet above sea level.
Many of the rare plants, formerly found here, have died
out since the destruction of the old forest for cultivation.
Wild pigs are plentiful; but the tigers do not often
repeat the predatory visits of twenty or thirty years ago,
when two or three hundred Chinamen were devoured
every year. They now very rarely cross the “ Old
Straits,” a channel about half a mile wide, which separates
the island from the mainland of Jahore.
In the Singapore Times, however, for Feb. 1, 1879,
the following paragraph appeared, which shows that
the brutes have not quite lost their old-established
man-eating desires:—
“ Tigers, it would appear, are approaching Singapore
town unpleasantly close. On the 29th January a Chinaman
was taken away by one on a plantation only about
four miles from town; and unpleasant rumours are
afloat that some have lately been seen in Sirangoon
and Changhie.”
Much fruit is grown ; and there are cocoa-nut,
gambir, pepper, indigo and gamboge plantations on a
small scale. Vegetable crops here, as in San Francisco,
are a monopoly of the thrifty Chinese gardeners. The
trade in economic products of the soil of the neighbouring
islands is an important one, and, ere long, when
cultivation extends more fully into Jahore and Perak,
this will be much increased. Some of the planters
from Ceylon have already commenced extensive clearing
operations in Jahore; and if these succeed, the rest is
but a question of time. A few rare and interesting plants
yet linger in the jungle, notably, the curious pitcher
plant (Nepenthes Bafflesiana), which, singularly enough,
is one of the first plants to spring up after a jungle fire.
Gleichenia dichotoma clothes some of the hill-sides here
as freely as the common brake-fern at home.
One of the most singular of native plants, however, is
that known as Amorphopliallus campanulatus, a relative
of the “ Lords and Ladies ” of our English woods; but
this tropical species is of Titanic dimensions, producing
a lurid spathe, nearly two feet in circumference, and
exhaling the most fetid and repulsive of odours.
In rambling about the island one comes across fertile
little gardens and groves of mangoes, mangosteen, and
other fruit trees, the tenants being generally Chinamen.
The bye-streets of the town present some novel sights to
a stranger, being tenanted for the most part by Chinese
artizans and shopkeepers, the workshops being generally
quite open to the street. Blacksmiths, tin-workers,
tailors and shoemakers, carpenters, coopers, and basket-
makers here ply their callings, and turn out excellent