WANDERINGS IN SOUTH AMERICA 33 



smelling resin, are all to be met with in the forest, 

 betwixt the plantations and the rock Saba. 



Beyond this rock the country has been little 

 explored ; but it is very probable that these, and 

 a vast collection of other kinds, and possibly many 

 new species, are scattered up and down, in all 

 directions, through the swamps, and hills, and sa- 

 vannas of ci-devant Dutch Guiana. 



On viewing the stately trees around him the 

 naturalist will observe many of them bearing 

 leaves, and blossoms, and fruit, not their own. 



The Wild Fig-tree, as large as a common Eng- 

 lish apple-tree, often rears itself from one of the 

 thick branches at the top of the mora ; and when 

 its fruit is ripe, to it the birds resort for nourish- 

 ment. It was to an undigested seed, passing- 

 through the body of the bird which had perched 

 on the mora, that the fig-tree first owed its ele- 

 vated station there. The sap of the mora raised 

 it into full bearing; but now, in its turn, it is 

 doomed to contribute a portion of its own sap and 

 juices towards the growth of a different species 

 of vines, the seeds of which, also, the birds de- 

 posited on its branches. These soon vegetate, and 

 bear fruit in great quantities ; so what with their 

 usurpation of the resources of the fig-tree, and the 

 fig-tree of the mora, the mora, unable to support 

 a charge which nature never intended it should, 

 languishes and dies under its burden; and then 

 the fig-tree, and its usurping progeny of vines, 

 receiving no more succour from their late foster- 

 parent, droop and perish in their turn. 



A vine, called the Bush-rope by the wood- 

 cutters, on account of its use in hauling out the 



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