214 . PROSERPINA. 



ous plants, mingled with the gramina, assumed the place 

 of the flowers of our meadows. Their form is indeed 

 striking ; they dazzle by the variety and splendor or 

 their colours ; but, too high above the soil, they disturb 

 that harmonious relation which exists among the plants 

 that compose our meadows and our turf. Nature, in 

 her beneficence, has given the landscape under every 

 zone its peculiar type of beauty. 



" After proceeding four hours across the savannahs, 

 we entered into a little wood composed of shrubs and 

 small trees, which is called El Pejual ; no doubt because 

 of the great abundance of the ' Pejoa ' (Gaultheria 

 odorata,) a plant with very odoriferous leaves. The 

 steepness of the mountain became less considerable, and 

 we felt an indescribable pleasure in examining the plants 

 of this region. Nowhere, perhaps, can be found col- 

 lected together in so small a space of ground, productions 

 so beautiful, and so remarkable in regard to the geogra- 

 phy of plants. At the height of a thousand toises, the 

 lofty savannahs of the hills terminate in a zone of 

 shrubs, which by their appearance, their tortuous 

 branches, their stiff leaves, and the dimensions and 

 beauty of their purple flowers, remind us of what is 

 called in the Cordilleras of the Andes the vegetation of 

 the paramos * and the punas. We find there the f am- 



* ' Deserts. ' Punas is not in my Spanish dictionary, and the 

 reference to a former note is wrong in my edition of Humboldt, vol. 

 iii. 3 p. 490. 



