348 PHYSIOGNOMY OF PLANTS. 



rapid ascent to the tops of lofty trees, the passage fronTtree to tree, 

 and even the crossing of streams by whole herds or troops of gre- 

 garious animals, are all greatly facilitated by these twining plants or 

 Lianes. 



In the South of Europe and in North America, Hops from among 

 the Urticeee, and the species of Vitis from among the Ampelideae, 

 belong to the class of twining climbers, and between the tropics we 

 find climbing Grasses or Grraminese. We have seen, in the plains of 

 Bogota, in the pass of Quindiu, in the Andes, and in the Quina- 

 producing forests of Loxa, a Bambusacea allied to Nastus, our Chus- 

 quea scandens, twine round massive and lofty trunks of trees adorned 

 at the same time with flowering Orchidese. T^he Bambusa scandens 

 (Tjankorreh), which Blume found in Java, belongs probably either 

 to the genus Nastus or to that of Chusquea, the Carrizo of the Span- 

 ish settlers. Twining plants appear to me to be entirely absent in 

 the Pine-woods of Mexico; but in New Zealand, besides the Ripogo- 

 num parviflorum of Robert Brown (a climber belonging to the Smi- 

 lacese which renders the forests almost impenetrable), the sweet- 

 smelling Freycinetia Banksii, which belongs to the Pandanese^ twines 

 round a gigantic Podocarpus 220 English feet high, the P. dacry- 

 oides (Rich), called in the native language Kakikatea. (Diefienbach, 

 Travels in New Zealand, 1843, vol. i. p. 426.) 



With climbing GrraminesB and Pandaneae are contrasted by their 

 beautiful and many-colored blossoms the Passifloras (among which, 

 however, we even found an arborescent, self-supporting species, Pas- 

 siflora glauca, growing in the Andes of Popayan, at an elevation of 

 9840 French (10,487 English) feet; the Bignoniaceae, Mutisias, 

 Alstrb'merias, Urvillese, and Aristolochias. Among the latter, our 

 Aristolochia cordata has a crimson-colored flower of 17 English 

 inches diameter ! "flares gigantei, pueris mitrae instar inservientes." 

 Many of these twining plants have a peculiar physiognomy and ap- 

 pearance, produced by the square shape of their stems, by flattenings 

 not caused by any external pressure, and by riband-like wavings to 

 and fro. Cross sections of Bignonias and Banisterias show cruciform 

 or mosaic figures produced by the mutual pressure and interpenetra- 

 tion of the stems which twine around each other. (See very accu- 



