316 THE LOG OF THE SUN 



stools, between the arches of which the water 

 flows and finds no chance to use its power. Here, 

 in these lonely solitudes, heron-haunted, snake- 

 infested, the hanging moss and orchids search 

 out every dead limb and cover it with an un- 

 natural greenness. Here, great lichens grow and 

 a myriad tropical insects bore and tunnel their 

 way from bark to heart of tree and back again. 

 Here, in the blackness of night, when the air is 

 heavy with hot, swampy odours, and only the 

 occasional squawk of a heron or cry of some ani- 

 mal is heard, a rending, grinding, crashing, breaks 

 suddenly upon the stillness, a distant boom and 

 splash, awakening every creature. Then the 

 silence again closes down and we know that a 

 cypress, perhaps linking a trio of centuries, has 

 yielded up its life. 



Leaving the hundred other mysteries which the 

 trees of the tropics might unfold, let us consider 

 for a moment the danger which the tall, success- 

 ful tree invites, the penalty which it pays for 

 having surpassed all its other brethren. It pre- 

 eminently attracts the bolts of Jove and the lesser 

 trees see a blinding flash, hear a rending of heart 

 wood, and when the storm has passed, the tree, 

 before perfect in trunk, limbs, and foliage, is now 

 but a heap of charred splinters. 



Many a great willow overhanging the banks of 

 a wide river could tell interesting tales of the 



