THE VOLCANO IRAZU 1 25 



the summit we saw the blue-green expanse of the forest- 

 covered plains of Santa Clara with the silver line of the Rio 

 Sucio winding towards the Sarapiqui. The Atlantic Ocean 

 we could not see at any time and now the clouds in the val- 

 leys cut off any view of the Pacific. We were less fortunate 

 than Stephens in early February, 1840, or Hoffmann, on 

 May 7, 1855, who record having seen both oceans from 

 this volcano. Clouds were gathering near Irazu even 

 before we made the summit, faint thin wisps of stratus 

 clouds that were not promising. We rode over a wall 

 some four hundred feet high, down into the largest crater 

 and dismounting there at 8.45, tethered the horses to a 

 bush. 



The floor of this crater is almost perfectly level, of fine 

 ash and cinders strewn with huge boulders and in it were 

 growing a few bushes, a pale yellow Gnaphalium {G. attenu- 

 atum) and many plants and patches of the showy Castil- 

 leja irasuensis, its red leaves and flowers looking even 

 brighter against the gray cinders. The cinders and small 

 stones were to a great extent covered with a gray, thick 

 powdery lichen, which gave a strange and deceptive appear- 

 ance of softness to the crater floor; there was also a quantity 

 of Chionolcsna lavandulacea, a low, much-branching Com- 

 posite plant with gray scale-like leaves and an immense root 

 system. In a few spots we saw a small Alpine saxifrage. 

 There were many patches of the huge Gunnera insignis es- 

 tablished especially on the walls of the steep-sided secon- 

 dary craters. The red-veined, roughly circular leaves of 

 this plant measured over a yard across and were borne on 

 thick stout petioles two to three feet long. The stem, ribs, 

 and to some extent the whole surface were covered with 

 short, sharp, recurved spines. The inflorescence was a 

 showy, crowded spike of little red flowers, eighteen inches 

 long. Although the conditions were highly unfavorable, we 



