THE PENINSULA OF YUCATAN. 179 



In the dry winter, however, the leaves fall off and the landscape would be quite like 

 that of a thick, bushy pasture in the United States at the same season, were it not that 

 in the late winter and early spring some of the bushes bear brilliant red, yellow, or white 

 flowers. As one goes inland from the north coast to regions of greater rainfall such as 

 Tekax and Peto, bush begins to give place to jungle. The size of the shrubby growths 

 increases; small trees, 20 feet high, become numerous; a considerable number of trees 

 rise to a height of 30 or 40 feet, and some are much higher. In spite of this, however, 

 neither the dense underbrush nor the larger trees suggest the deep, somber forest. Small 

 growths not over 20 feet high and with stems only 3 or 4 inches in diameter predominate. 

 Their aspect is like that of a second growth of timber in the northern United States, 15 or 

 20 years after the cutting of the original forest. A few bushes and even an occasional 

 tree of some special species may remain green throughout the year, but during the dry 

 season most become as bare as northern trees. With every mile that one advances into 

 the interior, however, the jungle becomes more permanently green, the density of the lower 

 growths increases, and the proportion of genuine trees becomes greater, until finally jungle 

 gives place to genuine forest. 



From the jungle to the forest the transition is rapid. A da}''s ride on horseback is 

 often sufficient to take one from a well-developed sample of one to an almost equally 

 well-developed sample of the other. The forest is of the kind whose descriptions we are 

 so famihar with. Many of the trees remain green throughout the year. They rise to 

 heights of 50 to 60 feet even on the borders of their pro\'ince, and at the top form a canopy 

 so that the ground is shady most of the time. Until 9 or 10 o'clock in the morning the rays 

 of the sun, even in the drier part of the year when a portion of the leaves have fallen, 

 scarcely reach the ground. Even at high noon the sunlight straggles through only in small 

 patches. Long, sinuous lianas, often queerly braided, hang down from the trees; epiphytes 

 and various other parasitic growths add their strange greens and reds to the continually 

 varied complex of plants. Young palms grow up almost in a day, and block a trail which 

 was passable only a few months before. WTierever the death of old trees forms an opening, 

 a hundred seedUngs begin a fierce race to reach the light and strangle their competitors. 

 Everywhere the dominant note is intensely vigorous life, rapid growth, and quick decay, 

 as befits the warm, moist air which rarely varies and never is so cold or dry as seriously to 

 interfere with the development of plants, even of the most highly sensitive types. 



Before passing on to discuss the effect of the vegetation and of other conditions on man, 

 a word as to the relation of the karst phenomena to vegetation. It is sometimes stated 

 that the paucity or rather the small size and xerophilous character of the vegetation ol 

 northern Yucatan is largely due to the dryness of the soil occasioned by the draining away 

 of the water through the caves and underground channels. Undoubtedly this is an im- 

 portant factor, but it may not be so important as is generally assumed. In no country 

 where the growing season is at all warm can a rainfall of 10 to 15 inches produce an3'thing 

 except vegetation of a distinctly arid type. In a country so warm as Yucatan 30 or 40 

 inches is by no means a large rainfall, and even if none of it were lost in the karst, the 

 country would still be relatively arid because of the great evaporation, especially during 

 the long dry season. Still farther south not only on the edges, but actually within the limits 

 of the genuine forest, karst phenomena seem to be as marked as near the northern coast, 

 but this does not prevent the growth of the rankest kind of vegetation. It seems, therefore, 

 that while the karsted character of the country plays a part in preventing the growth of 

 vegetation, it is by no means so important as the relatively small amount of precipitation. 



To turn now from the physical aspects of Yucatan to its people, the inhabitants consist 

 of every gradation from pure Indians to pure Spaniards. The forests and the remoter 

 villages are occupied by pure Indians of the Maya stock; the small towns and the less 

 remote villages are peopled by a mixed race of Mestizos, in which the Indian element 



