and myself collecting growing plants and seeds of the Ivory 
Palm. If time allows, I shall make an excursion to the moun¬ 
tains in that district, and return to Santa Martha about the 
middle or end of March. I have much to do there and mean to 
make the best possible use of my opportunities and to bring 
with me all the plants I can. 
If there is anything you particularly desire to receive from 
Jamaica, have the goodness to specify it: my acquaintance 
with the stations in that island will probably enable me to 
procure it without difficulty, and it is probable I must come 
home via Jamaica. 
Santa Martha, February 21st, 1845. 
I returned to this place a month ago and was laid up imme¬ 
diately for a fortnight, with fever and ague : though weak, I 
am now recovered. There is much fever in the country, carr 3 dng 
off great numbers of people. My first business has been to 
prepare my plants, which are despatched by this day’s Packet 
(the list is enclosed). They have been gathered some time and 
are packed in the way recommended by Mr. Smith in his last 
letter; so that I trust they will arrive in the same excellent 
order they are in now. I particularly wish that the bulbs of the 
trailing Oncidium may succeed : they are delicate. They should 
be twisted round a mossy branch and placed in a cool part of 
the stove, their native habitat being river-courses, 4,000 feet 
above the level of the sea. 
I take the hberty of mentioning that the thermometers arrived 
safely; but they are of no use to me ; because I want them to 
ascertain heights, which can be estimated sufficiently accurately 
by a thermometer for all botanical purposes. For instance, 
my thermometer gave the altitude, which I reached on the Sierra 
Nivada, as 14,500 feet; and I calculated the snowy peaks above 
to be 2,000 feet higher than where I stood; and as this amounts 
to the same measurement as Humboldt, and I tested the eleva¬ 
tion again when I descended, I feel satisfied with the general 
correctness of my reckoning. But the thermometers now sent 
are unfit even for the common temperature of the tropics, their 
range being only 1^0° Fahr.; so that riding in the sun would burst 
them in my pocket. Unfortunately I am now without one; for a 
thermometer which I purchased in Jamaica was broken at the 
time of my illness. 
The boxes contain many fine plants. No. 3 is perhaps among 
the noblest of Orchidea ; its pseudo-bulbs resemble those of a 
