A NATURALIST IN BRAZIL 



sprawling blooms of the Cassia. Here and there the yellow star of 

 a Heteropteris peeped from the bushes; in this flower five prettily 

 serrated petals stand upon little stalks which touch in the centre. 

 There were blossoming peas here too, rose and violet ; in one species 

 (Fasceolus) the long narrow pod, strangely enough, grows out of the 

 flower while the latter is still blooming. 



It was always a joy to me to find the Passion-flower in the forest 

 or upon its fringes ; a green sea of foliage enveloped the supporting 

 trees, and the great blue stars of the flowers looked down with their 

 grave and lovely gaze (Fig. 13). Ten petals form the star, five of 

 which are really coloured sepals. Above this star lies a second, con- 

 sisting of fine, slightly crinkled threads, mottled with a glorious blue. 

 They have been likened to the crown of thorns, and the stamens, 

 rising from a centre which is adorned with circles of brilliant colour, 

 have the form of nails, while the ovaries, with their three pistils, have 

 been compared to a scourge. Passion-flowers with large red blossoms 

 also are found in Pernambuco; in these the stamens are violet, 

 flecked with white, and other kinds have whole racemes of blossom. 

 The combination of lovely colour, delicate mottling, and decorative 

 form is bewitching in all of them. Their mode of propagation befits 

 their poetical beauty; for their large flowers are fertilized by the 

 flying jewels of America, the humming-birds ; the coronet of fila- 

 ments apparently traps the insects on which these tiny birds feed. 

 I shall say something of the fruit of the Passion-flower in the tenth 

 chapter. 



In Sao Paulo too I saw flowering lianas. In the forests of Alto da 

 Serra the red flowers of a climbing Begonia shone as though self- 

 luminous. Delightful too were the snow-white, woolly flowers of a 

 Hylaea, which grew sometimes on the ground and sometimes 

 climbed the trees ; they reminded me of edelweiss, but were much 

 larger. In August — so a Sao Paulo botanist, S. Decker, informed 

 me — showers of orange blooms fall from the branches of the trees 

 upon the surface of the rivers ; they are the flowers of the climbing 

 Pyrostegia. I myself saw waves of the turquoise-blue flowers of Thun- 

 bergia and the red Bougainvillea surging over walls and garden 

 doors, and the scarlet racemes of the "Cipo tape." These flowers, in 

 shape like a sweet-pea, are incomparably luminous. One stands as 

 though dazzled before the bushes which they adorn. And in the 

 droop of the red racemes there is something lavish and generous 

 which still further enhances the charm of these children of Nature. 



The lianas have been likened to garlands, but it is only on the 



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