THE VIRGIN FOREST 



form, another, closely hemmed in, shoots up towards the light, 

 putting forth only the shortest boughs; while a third is deprived 

 of light and air until it overtops the rest, and begins, when it is 

 free to do so, to spread itself abroad like an umbrella-pine. Thus the 

 outline of this forest is irregular, and this irregularity gives a certain 

 wildness to the scene ; the forest seems to be bursting with primeval 

 energy, and it is as though those fir-trees which have shot up 

 regardless of the pressure exerted on every side were proclaiming 

 their victory. 



The European forest, however, is naturally inclined to uniformity. 

 In the foliaceous woods the densely-clad tree-tops are so inextricably 

 intermingled that one cannot see where one tree leaves off and 

 another begins. Our woods, seen from outside, give the impression 

 of an unbroken green fleece whose gentle undulations are marked 

 by faint shadows and transitions of tone. The whole is as though 

 painted in water-colour. The tropical forest could be painted only 

 in oils, and the gaze rests with content on the deep, vivid, saturated 

 greens with their gleaming high-lights. The greens of the tropics 

 are for the most part darker than our greens ; even by the Mediter- 

 ranean the golden oranges glow in a sombre foliage. 



But the tender, uniform colouring of the outer surface of the 

 forest is absent in the torrid zone. Here each tree-top stands out 

 bodily and individually; each shows a different shade of green, 

 and thus the picture is rich in colour and modelling. The face of 

 the forest is netted and streaked by the light-coloured boughs and 

 trunks, for just as human beings prefer to wear white in the tropics, 

 so the trees prefer to cover themselves with bark of a light colour. 

 And on account of the sparse foliage one can distinguish the 

 scaffolding of the boughs quite a long way off; for these even break 

 through the crown of the tree, curling out against the sky in the 

 most singular fashion. On the hills of Ceylon, where the tree-tops 

 were of all different colours, from red and yellow to green, the trees 

 reminded one strikingly of cauliflowers, although this did not in 

 the least detract from the beauty of the scene. In the mountains the 

 air was so limpid that one seemed to distinguish every leaf, and 

 under the blue sky the plastic solidity of the forest was indescribable. 

 In Brazil also the details of the trees were distinguishable even at 

 a distance; on attempting to paint a Brazilian landscape I found 

 I could not wash in the colour with a soft brush; with a sable as 

 fine as that of a miniature-painter I had to lay point beside sharply- 

 defined point of colour. The tropics call for a special technique of 



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