support, and obliterated liini entirely. The phenomenon, in all its stages, was a 

 constant source of astonishment to our little botanical i)arty. 



The Ceiba is also the fruitful bearer of innumerable air-plants, which cluster on 

 its branches, and display their gorgeous flowers on premises not their own.* 



The Ceiba bears no resemblance to any of our own trees. It is remarkable in 

 its formation just above the roots, where the body resembles a tripod, imperfectly 

 represented in the drawing ; it has in fact three hollows and three corresponding 

 long protuberant supports, between each of which several men could readily 

 shelter themselves in a heavy gale. The air-plants have a secure resting place, 

 the height of the tree and its limbless trunk making them very inaccessible. The 

 Ceiba is not very useful, its only product being a kind of wool from its seed pod, 

 which is used by the poorer classes to stuff pillows and chairs, but is generally 

 thought unwholesome to lie upon.f 



Among the most agreeable hours spent in Havana, we should be most un- 

 grateful if we were not to place on record the time passed with Don Francisco 

 Sauvalle, an extensive planter, but to be distinguished in science when most other 

 planters will have left no other mementos than their bones. Mr. Sauvalle is a 

 botanist of that true kind who find their reward in the pursuit of the delightful 

 study. He has taken up the topic of the trees of Cuba, and, wonderful to relate, 

 he has drawn and described no less than seven hundred, excluding shrubs, for 

 which he has not yet found time ; but, more wonderful still, he is in the midst 

 of his pursuit, and can yet see no termination to his labors. He finds thirty native 

 palms on the island, though, if we remember rightly, several of the best previous 

 botanists describe less than half the number. With estates in different parts of 

 the island, and leisure for study, this gentleman has done, and is doing, for Cuba 

 what the Michauxs (father and son) did for the United States ; but he has, in a 

 smaller space, a much greater field, so extraordinary is the vegetation, and so 

 much greater the number of species. Mr. S. has no view of publishing, at least 

 for the present, and when we urged upon him the importance and utility of such 

 a step, he thought it would be delegated to his sons. Their great and growing 

 intelligence will, we trust, carefully treasure the valuable scientific knowledge 

 their father is accumulating, and give it to the world ; for, strange as it may seem, 

 even the trees of Cuba are (very many of them) unknown, and if this is so, what 

 undiscovered treasures must exist among plants of smaller growth ! 



Among much miscellaneous information elicited by questions to Mr. S., we 

 noted down a few particulars, which may interest : — 



The cedar wood, of which there seems to be an inexhaustible supply for cigar- 

 boxes, is the Cedrella odorata. It is one of the most valual)le and useful trees 

 of the island (if not the most so), from its extraordinary durability. They say it 

 never rots ; its uses are consequently very various. Employed in the place of 

 mahogany, it makes the beams of houses that are so prominent an object in the 

 ceilings, where they are carved or plain as taste or wealth dictates. The polished 

 doors of houses are also made of this, having the color, but not the veining of 

 mahogany. 



There is another tree, that has the novel property of keeping on fire after it is 

 dried. The highest wind will not extinguish it, and, of course, its value is great, 



* When enveloped by the giant, these plants are all swept away. 



f This is the Bomhax Ceiha, and is one of the tallest trees of both Indies ; the wood is 

 very light, and is xised for canoes, their trunks being so large, that, when hollowed, they 

 make very large ones, frequently carrying from fifteen to twenty hogsheads of sugar. When 

 tree decays, it becomes a nest for the Macaca beetle, the caterpillar of which, when 

 s esteemed by many persons as one of the greatest delicacies. 



