17 



course derive their nourishment entirely from the abundant 

 dews. These curious plants are, for the most part, a species 

 of wild pine, and although found suspended to the branches 

 of trees, and apparently existing without any other nourish- 

 ment than air, they are really fed, as I have said, by the 

 heavy moistures of the night. One of the most remarkable 

 of them is the green snake, which looks exactly like a long 

 serpent made of coloured india-rubber. It lays on the 

 branches of the trees, but requires no earth, and subsists on 

 dew. The common life-plant of the tropics grows every- 

 where, and, together with the air-plants, affords much 

 curiosity to visitors from Europe and America. If you 

 take one of its thick, waxy, oak leaf-shaped leaves and 

 hang it on a nail, it will live for months and shoot forth 

 new leaves without needing either water or earth. 



The maladies of all others which Nassau benefits most 

 are those of the lungs and nervous system, and this I am 

 assured is now the opinion of the leading medical men in 

 New York. For the advantage of such of my readers who 

 might perhaps wish to visit this charming resort, I quote 

 the following valuable remarks from the New York 

 'Medical Record,' February, 1877 : — 



"The drinking water of Nassau is of two kinds — that from 

 reservoirs, being stored rain-water collected from the roofs of 

 houses ; and that from wells. The former only is generally used 

 by the well-to-do white population, exclusively so at the hotel, 

 and is an unusually good potable water. 



******* 



" The surface drainage of the city is excellent. Water soon dis- 

 appears, either through the gutters cut in the stone — which, by the 

 way, are very good — at the roadside, or by percolation. It would 

 hardly be possible to find a stagnant pool of any kind. The 



[42] C 



