SCESERY OF T1IE TALLS. 299 



From the summit of the rock is descried a steet of foam, 

 extending the length of a whole mile. Enormous masses of 

 stone, black as iron, issue from its bosom. Some are paps 

 grouped in pairs, like basaltic hills; others resemble towers, 

 fortified castles, and ruined buildings. Their gloomy tint 

 contrasts with the silvery splendour of the foam. Every 

 rock, every islet is covered with vigorous trees, collected in 

 clusters. At the foot of those paps, far as the eye can reach, 

 a thick vapour is suspended over the river, and through this 

 whitish fog the tops of the lofty palm-trees shoot up. What 

 name shall we give to these majestic plants? I suppose 

 them to be the vadgiai, a new species of the genus Oreodoxa, 

 the trunk of which is more than eighty feet high. The fea- 

 thery leaves of this palm-tree have a brilliant lustre, and rise 

 almost straight toward the sky. At every hour of the day 

 the sheet of foam displays different aspects. Sometimes the 

 hilly islands and the palm-trees project their broad shadows ; 

 sometimes the rays of the setting sun are refracted in the 

 cloud that hangs over the cataract, and coloured arcs are 

 formed which vanish and appear alternately. 



Such is the character of the landscape discovered from the 

 top of the mountain of Manimi, which no traveller has yet 

 described. I do not hesitate to repeat, that neither time, 

 nor the view of the Cordilleras, nor any abode in the tem- 

 perate vallies of Mexico, has effaced from my mind the 

 powerful impression of the aspect of the cataracts. When I 

 read a description of those places in India that are embel- 

 lished by running waters and a vigorous vegetation, my 

 imagination retraces a sea of foam and palm-trees, the tops 

 of which rise above a stratum of vapour. The majestic 

 scenes of nature, like the sublime works of poetry and the 

 arts, leave remembrances that are incessantly awakening, 

 and which, through the whole of life, mingle with all our 

 feelings of what is grand and beautiful. 



The calm of the atmosphere, and the tumultuous move- 

 ment of the waters, produce a contrast peculiar to this zone. 

 Here no breath of wind ever agitates the foliage, no cloud 

 veils the splendour of the azure vault of heaven; a great 

 mass of light is diffused in the air, on the earth strewn with 

 plants with glossy leaves, and on the bed of the river, which 

 extends as far as the eye can reach. This appearance 



