452 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS [vOL. 45 



" Canete and Chincha to the south, and all the ports north of 

 us as far as Trujillo, report feeling the shock severely. News is 

 not at present obtainable from Cerro de Pasco, the railway having 

 suffered from land-slides. 



" No tidal wave accompanied the shock here. 



" The earthquake of March 4, 1904, is generally admitted to have 

 been the severest felt in Peru since 1868. The last phenomenon 

 of the kind experienced here was on September 20, 1897, and was 

 of a much lighter nature." 



A Recent Visit to the Coffee Mountains of Liberia 



The following extract from a despatch, dated March 2, 1904, 

 from Consul General Ernest Lyon at Monrovia, Liberia, has been 

 officially communicated to the Smithsonian Institution by the De- 

 partment of State : 



" We left Carysburg Sunday afternoon at 3 130 for the Coffee 

 mountains, a place of interest to all tourists who come to Liberia. 

 The distance to the principal mountain in the range is about twenty- 

 five miles. The range received its name because the aborigines 

 found coffee growing on its summits. The path to the mountains 

 lies through the dense forest which abounds in rich timbers and 

 interesting flora. The timber consists of a variety of valuable 

 woods, some of which are the following: red and gray mahogany, 

 four varieties of oak, cedar, rosewood, mangrove, whitegum, burr- 

 wood, mulberry, sassawood, brimstone, redpeach, pepperwood, 

 white-mangrove, persimmon, ironwood, poplar, and greasypeach. 

 If it will be of interest to the department, this office will furnish 

 samples of some of the valuable woods. 



" The flora is not only interesting but possesses value for me- 

 dicinal purposes. The forest for one hundred miles whither I have 

 been is lined with a variety of these valuable herbs. There is 

 scarcely a leaf or berry or root, according to the intelligent native 

 medicine-man who was paid to accompany us, which cannot be 

 utilized as a medicine for the diseases common to Africa ; for in- 

 stance, the corsa is a species of leaves which may be used as a 

 purgative or for the cure of ulcers ; the corsa is used also for weak- 

 ness and imbecility as well as for a general stimulant ; and there are 

 many others, as the Xmas-leaf, cherrybark, alum, senna, etc., each of 

 which has its medicinal use. 



" The next day at 11 a.m. we reached the foot of the principal 

 mountain. It was impossible to reach the top, but after a climb 



