Dec, 1901.] Notes of Travel in Porto Rico. 163. 



filled up during a period when the sea was slightly higher thau 

 at present, whence it has receded and left the island of to-day. 

 They are covered with a characteristic jungle, rising conspicu- 

 ously out of which is the "Llume" palm (Aen'a attemiata) whose 

 graceful stem, only about half a foot thick at the base, attains a 

 height of a hundred feet, tapering till it is only three or four 

 inches thick at the top. It is nearly white and at a distance 

 entirely invisable, so that the crown of leaves looks as though it 

 were floating around in the air above the surrounding vegetation. 



Further inland the limestone hills give way to others of red 

 clay. The clay, like the limestone, is very deeply eroded. In 

 most places it is so continually washed down that the sides of the 

 hills stand always at the critical angle and are ready to slide from 

 under the feet of the explorer. Indeed it would be impossible to 

 climb them were it not for the numerous bushes CA-erywhere 

 standing ready to lay hold on. Here abound ferns, Melasto- 

 maceae and other plants of humid regions. Tree ferns are ver}- 

 common ; the largest belong to one species of Cyathia. Its 

 beauty is simply beyond description. Imagine, you who have 

 never seen it, a trunk thirty feet tall surmounted by a crown of a 

 dozen or fifteen great leaves made up of a score or two pinnae of 

 the size and grace of ordinary ferns and you have the compon- 

 ents — not the ensemble — of the tree fern. 



This red clay region is the land of coffee. Everywhere the 

 novice thinks the hilLside covered with jungle, which turns out 

 to be only poorly kept coffee plantations. The coffee region is 

 coextensive with the range of several plants. Two or three 

 species of the pepper family, with large peltate or round leaves, 

 are found only here ; and with one or two exceptions the Melas- 

 tomaceae occur only in this wet country. They are a very large 

 group of plants common throughout the tropics, but represented 

 in the northern states by the common Rhexia. Its members may 

 be known anywhere by their three-nerved leaves, many of which 

 are beautifully patterned and marked so that even among other 

 tropical plants they are conspicuous for their beauty. 



When we cross the summit we come upon a different sort of 

 vegetation ; cacti take the place of tree ferns, and instead of wet 

 jungles we have dry scrub brush full of spiny and thorny shrubs 

 with almost every sort of prickle one can think of. One who has 

 never encountered them can scarcely appreciate the abundance 

 and effectiveness of tropical thorns. These thickets of brush 

 extend over most of the undisturbed portion of the south side. 

 Everywhere through them there are scattered cacti of several 

 sorts ; but near Guayanilla. a few miles west of Ponce, these 

 become relatively much more numerous so as to form a veritable 

 cactus desert. Only here is the largest form present. It is a 

 large Opuntia with a bare stem and long arms radiating in one 



