204 FKOM PANAMA TO BODEGAS. 



vegetation. Large plantations of the rustling-leaved ba- 

 nana alternate with extensive forests of cacao, the tree 

 which yields the chocolate of commerce. Twenty-five 

 million pounds are annually exported from Guayaquil, the 

 greater portion of which is produced upon the Guayas and 

 its tributaries. Orange-trees bend under their load of 

 golden fruit, while the magnificent mango and the bread- 

 tree, with its immense leaves, lend diversity to the vege- 

 tation. Here and there, seeking the Avater's edge, waves 

 a grove of graceful grasses. It seems strange to speak of 

 grasses as forming forest ; but here that arboreal gramina, 

 the Bairibusa guadua, which has a deeper social instinct 

 than most species of tropical j^lants, forms dense, beauti- 

 ful thickets. The tall, slender stalk, rising forty feet and 

 upward, sways in the slightest breeze, and when swept 

 by heavy winds the groves bend and rock like fields of 

 grain. This gramina is only surpassed in beauty by the 

 stately palm, which we must crown as the " prince of tropi- 

 cal vegetation." So expressive of elegance and grace, it is 

 not strange that it has been the favorite of all poets whose 

 home has been the home of the palm. But Flora's king- 

 dom, varied and wonderful as it is, aflbrds not all of the 

 attractions of these regions. Animated Nature is not 

 lacking in representatives here. Nowhere in South Amer- 

 ica, not even in the teeming valley of the Amazons, did 

 we observe a greater variety of ornithic forms, or find any 

 characterized by moi'e varied or brilliant plumage. The 

 marshes were whitened with aquatic birds, which also 

 flecked the air. Only a few monkeys, however, were seen ; 

 for, of the eighty-six species found in the New World, not 

 more than three or four inhabit the forest west of the An- 

 des. But the sluggish waters of the Guayas afford a con- 

 genial home for alligators, of which hundreds lined the 

 banks with their cuirassed bodies, which, upon our ap- 

 proach, would slowly glide into the water, their move- 



