80 



THE TROPICAL WORLD. 



the giant chain of the Andes spreads out, as it enters Mexico, 

 into a vast sheet of table-land, which maintains an elevation of 

 from 6,000 to 9,000 feet for the distance of 200 leagues, until 

 it gradually declines in the higher latitudes of tlie north, or de- 

 scends in successive stages to the sea-board of the Atlantic. 

 To this remarkable geological formation the land, though 

 warmed during a part of the year by the rays of a vertical sun, 

 owes that astonishing variety of climate and productions which 

 would make it the envy of the earth, if peopled by a race that 

 knew better how to utilize the gifts of Nature. 



All along the Mexican Gulf stretches a broad zone of low- 

 lands, called the tierra caliente, or hot region, which has the 

 usual high temperature of the tropics. Parched and sandy 

 plains, dotted with mimosas and prickly opuntias, are inter- 

 mingled with savannahs, and woodlands of exuberant fertility. 

 The branches of the stately forest trees are festooned with 

 clustering vines of the dark purple grape, convolvuli, and other 

 flowering parasites of the most brilliant dyes. The undergrowth 

 of prickly aloe, matted with 

 wild rose and honeysuckle, 

 makes in many places an 

 almost impervious thicket. 

 In this wilderness of sweet- 

 smelling buds and blossoms 

 flutter birds of the parrot 

 tribe, and clouds of butter- 

 flies, whose colour, nowhere 

 so gorgeous as here, rival 

 those of the vegetable world ; while birds of exquisite song, — 

 the scarlet cardinal, and the mocking-bird that comprehends 

 in his own notes the whole music of a forest, — fill the air 

 with melody. 



But, like the genius of evil, the malaria engendered by the 

 decomposition of rank vegetable substances in the hot and 

 humid soil, poisons these enchanting retreats, and from the 

 spring to the autumnal equinox renders them dangerous or 

 fatal to man. 



Hastening to escape from its influence, the traveller, after 

 passing some twenty leagues across the dreaded region of the 

 yellow-fever, finds himself rising into a purer atmosphere. His 



MOCKIKG-BIRD. 



