TROPICAL SCENERY. 97 



characteristic beauty : to the tropics belong diversity and 

 grandeur in the forms of plants ; to the north, the aspect of 

 tracts of meadow-land, and the periodic and long-desired re- 

 vival of nature at the earliest breath of the gentle breezes of 

 spring. As in the Musaceae (Pisang) we have the greatest 

 expansion, so in the Casuarinae and in the needle-tree we have 

 the greatest contraction of the leaf vessels. Firs, Thujae, and 

 Cypresses constitute a northern flora which is very uncommon 

 in the plains of the tropics. Their ever- verdant green enlivens 

 the dreary winter landscape, and proclaims to the inhabitants 

 of the north that, even when snow and ice have covered the 

 ground, the inner life of vegetation, like Promethean fire, is 

 never extinguished on our planet. 



Every zone of vegetation has, besides its own attractions, a 

 peculiar character, which calls forth in us special impressions. 

 Referring here only to our own native plants, I would ask, 

 who does not feel himself variously affected beneath the som- 

 ber shade of the beech, on hills crowned with scattered pines, 

 or in the midst of grassy plains, where the wind rustles among 

 the trembling leaves of the birch ? As in different organic 

 beings we recognize a distinct physiognomy, and as descriptive 

 botany and zoology are, in the strict definition of the words, 

 merely analytic classifications of animal and vegetable forms, 

 so there is also a certain physiognomy of nature exclusively 

 peculiar to each portion of the earth. The idea which the 

 artist wishes to indicate by the expressions " Swiss nature" or 

 " Italian skies," is based on a vague sense of some local char- 

 acteristic. The azure of the sky, the form of the clouds, the 

 vapory mist resting in the distance, the luxuriant development 

 of plants, the beauty of the foliage, and the outline of the 

 mountains, are the elements which determine the total im- 

 pression produced by the aspect of any particular region. To 

 apprehend these characteristics, and to reproduce them visibly, 

 is the province of landscape painting ; while it is permitted to 

 the artist, by analyzing the various groups, to resolve beneath 

 his touch the great enchantment of nature — if I may venture 

 on so metaphorical an expression — as the written words of 

 men are resolved into a few simple characters. 



But, even in the present imperfect condition of pictorial de 

 Uneations of landscapes, the engravings which accompany, and 

 too often disfigure, our books of travels, have, however, con- 

 tributed considerably toward a knowledge of the physiognomy 

 of distant regions, to the taste for voyages in the tropical zones, 

 and to a more active study of nature. The improvements in 



Vol. II.— E 



