22 



special study, would never finish their examination, so prodi- 

 gious is the variety of their species, many of which are only 

 seen after the fall of the protector upon which they lived. 



There is no part of Brazil, no latitude, no elevation above 

 the sea, where are not to be found Orchidacese as difl;erent 

 from each other as the conditions under which they grow. 

 Some bask in the heat of the plains, others luxuriate in the 

 agreeable freshness of a stream of water, attaching them- 

 selves to the branches of the trees which cover the waves 

 with a verdant grotto ; and others, real children of the mist, 

 delight in a drizzling atmosphere, and support with ease 

 the violence of stormy winds, and the often icy coldness of 

 the Serras, whether stationed within a few feet of the earth, 

 or swinoino- in the air from the boughs of the ancient 

 patriarchs of the forest. Some grow in deep recesses and 

 gloomy arcades, where there is a perpetual circulation 

 of a damp and heated atmosphere; others, on the contrary, 

 prefer the open glades, or Rocas, where some fallen trees, 

 whose own foliage has perished, supply them with a scant}'^ 

 but sufficient nourishment. 



It is impossible to form an idea of a tropical forest by the 

 woods of Europe, where the ivy is the only parasite which 

 finds a permanent support. The Sertoes, or virgin woods, 

 which cover a part of America, present the traveller with 

 scenery incomparable for its majestic character, and rich 

 variety. Who is there that would not be astonished at find- 

 ing himself amidst a vegetation, of which each individual 

 struggles with its neighbour for existence, darting up, eagerly 

 searching for the light of a cloudless sun and a purer air, 

 only to be found at a prodigious elevation, and leaving dark- 

 ness and vrater at their feet. It is here that trees of patri- 

 archal age perish in the embrace of enormous climbers which 

 overwhelm and bear them down, and which are some- 

 times carried overhead like cables, in other cases interlaced 

 like the meshes of a net, and not unfrequently stand like 

 lofty leaf-capped columns of spiral open-work, after the trees 

 about which they have writhed themselves have fallen to decay 

 within their grasp. 



Amidst this forest of ropes of sylvan rigging, grow in- 

 numerable Ferns, which hang down in plumes, or festoons, or 

 the gayest lacework, vast quantities of Araceous plants, and 

 especially Tillandsias, forming broad patches of verdure 



