A BRAZILIAN FOEEST. 170 



stem as high as its own width ; — to stand under the 

 beautiful arch and gaze upwards on the filigree-fretted 

 fronds that formed a great umbrella of verdure, — this 

 ■was most charmino^, and never to be forgotten. 



The eloquent pen of Charles Darwin has revivified for 

 us, with a peculiar charm, the impressions made on his 

 refined and poetic mind by the strange scenes of other 

 lands. His first experiences of the forests of South 

 America he has thus recorded : — " The day has passed 

 delightfully. Delight itself, however, is a weak term to 

 express the feelings of a naturalist, who, for the first time, 

 has wandered by himself in a Brazilian forest. The 

 elegance of the grasses, the novelty of the parasitical 

 plants, the beauty of the flowers, the glossy green of the 

 foliage, but, above all, the general luxuriance of the 

 vegetation, filled me with admiration. A most paradoxi- 

 cal mixture of sound and silence pervades the shady parts 

 of the wood. The noise from the insects is so loud, that 

 it may be heard even in a vessel anchored several hundred 

 yards from the shore ; yet within the recesses of the 

 forest a universal silence appears to reign. To a person 

 fond of natural history, such a day as this brings with it 

 a deeper pleasure than he can hoj^e to experience again." * 



Again, at the close of his eventful voyage, he thus 

 reverts to the same scenes : — " Such are the elements of 

 the scenery, but it is a hopeless attempt to paint the 

 general effects. Learned naturalists describe these scenes 

 of the tropics by naming a multitude of objects, and men- 



* Naturalist's Voyage, ch. i. 



