THE SCAVENGERS OF THE SHORE 



gill-chambers. The eyes were then washed with the palps of the 

 large mandibles. 



• • • • • 



Around Recife the mangroves form only a bushy growth, for the 

 large trees have long ago been felled, and even the copse-wood 

 growing from the roots and stumps is continually cut; for not only 

 does the mangrove yield a wood which is used in cabinet-making, 

 but the bark contains as much as 40 per cent, of tannin. To 

 the naturalist the mangrove is of peculiar interest, for this plant 

 is "viviparous," and strange as it may seem to apply an expression 

 which is commonly used of animals to a motionless green vegetable, 

 the word is none the less justified. 



The fruit of the mangrove-tree has the form of a little green pear, 

 and while still in the pear the seedling sprouts from the seed, whereas 

 in other cases the seed does not germinate until the fruit has fallen 

 from the tree. The seedling even develops a special suctorial organ, 

 by which it sucks nutriment from the fruit, and the plant continues 

 to supply the fruit with this nutriment : a state of affairs which is 

 really comparable to the development of the embryo in the body 

 of a mammal. In the case of the mangrove the seedling grows 

 bigger and bigger, stretches itself out, breaks through the lower 

 part of the fruit, and finally hangs out of it, in shape like a thick 

 bean, some sixteen inches in length. This apparent bean, however, 

 is the stem of the young plant ; it is already fairly heavy, and pointed 

 at the lower end. At last the time comes when the fruit can no 

 longer support it, when it falls out, plunges into the water, and 

 rams itself into the underlying mud, all by virtue of its weight and 

 shape. Thus the mangrove, although it grows above the water, 

 is nevertheless able to plant its seedlings in the ground : a truly 

 wonderful adaptation ! — In a few hours' time the young plant 

 has already begun to anchor itself in the mud by pushing out lateral 

 roots, and can no longer be washed away. 



Full-grown mango-trees are to be seen only here and there in 

 the neighbourhood of Recife and Santos (Plate 10). On other 

 parts of the coast, however, the swamp-forest is more nearly intact ; 

 I saw the finest trees on the frontier of the States of Pernambuco 

 and Alagoa, at Tamandare, on the Estiva estate. Here a fairly wide 

 river flows down from the hills near by, forms a mangrove-swamp, 

 and then turns aside, flowing back to the swamp some distance 

 from the sea. The sea flows into this swamp, and its waters rise and 

 fall with the ebb and flow of the tide. 



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