270 Singing Birds and Sweet Flowers in Jamaica. 



But as it is in the lowland plains and cultivated estates that we 

 most abundantly hear the melody of singing birds, so here do the 

 plaintive voices of the doves fall most frequently upon the ear. The 

 White wing (Turtur leucopterus) and the Pea-Dove (^Zenaida ama- 

 bilis) are essentially lowland birds ; and these, with the exception 

 of the Whitebelly, are the most incessant and the most tender of all 

 our cooers. Not, however, that we hear their voices immediately 

 around the homestead ; when they come into the open pastures to 

 feed, they are usually wary and silent; but from the surrounding 

 woods, the tall thick trees of the fens, and especially the impene- 

 trable mangrove morasses, their loud, but sweetly gentle, meanings fall 

 with mournful, pleasing cadence upon the ear. The Pea-Dove's voice 

 is the more tender, and is particularly prominent in the evening, while 

 the blustering sea-breeze gradually lulls itself to repose ; the longer, 

 sharper, and more impatient call of the Whitewing is most heard 

 in the morning, though each season brings the notes of both birds 

 from all parts of the woods around. They are respectively charac- 

 teristic of the quietude of the late and early hours. 



None but those who have listened to these gentle voices can tell 

 what an effect they produce upon the mind. Their tender melan- 

 choly communicates itself to the hearer ; and though reason tells 

 him that they are the expressions of buoyant joy and health, he can 

 scarcely fail to feel a pang of sympathy for what seems to be the 

 complaint of gentleness in distress. 



Nor is it true that our groves and fields are destitute of fragrance. 

 In spring the oranges and limes that are planted in such profusion 

 upon every estate, both in mountain and in plain, and even border 

 the public roads, are covered with their abundant blossom, and the 

 air all around is loaded with the richest perfume. So it is in the 

 upland districts, when the coffee plantations are in bloom ; the 

 flower of which tree is as fragrant as it is delicately beautiful. In 

 the edges and borders of woods, there is a common shrub called 

 Wild Coffee (Tetramerium odoratissimum), nearly allied to the cul- 

 tivated species botanically, as it is both in beauty and fragrance. 

 Butterflies, moths, bees, and flies, throng around its lovely white 

 blossoms, the delicious and powerful odour from which is diffused to 

 a great distance. 



I have observed that many flowers in Jamaica possess the aro- 

 matic odour so much admired in our pinks and carnations, that of 

 the clove. The beautiful plants called the red and the white Spanish 

 jasmine (Plumrpria rubra and P. alba), common shrubs, whose 

 thick stems, leathery leaves, and noble spikes of blossom, form so 

 striking objects in the smaller woods, have this odour. I found it 

 in the blossom of a species of Pancratium, with small bulbs and 

 large oval leaves, growing on the St Elizabeth Mountains; the 

 fragrance, which was very abundant, I should not have been able to 

 distinguish from that of a carnation. That gorgeous flower, the 



