110 GLAUCUS ; OR, 



to great) to those who, descending the Andes, 

 pass in a single day from the vegetation of the 

 Arctic zone to that of the Tropics. And here 

 and there, even at half-tide level, deep rock- 

 basins, shaded from the sun and always full of 

 water, keep up in a higher zone the vegetation 

 of a lower one, and afford in miniature an anal- 

 ogy to those deep " barrancos " which split the 

 liigh table-land of Mexico, down whose awful 

 cliffs, swept by cool sea-breezes, the traveller 

 looks from among the plants and animals of the 

 temperate zone, and sees far below, dim through 

 their everlastuag vapor-bath of rank hot steam, 

 the mighty forms and gorgeous colors of a tropic 

 forest, 



"I do not wonder," says Mr. Gosse, in his 

 charming "Naturalist's Rambles on the Devon- 

 shire Coast," * " that when Southey had an op- 

 portunity of seeing some of those beautiful quiet 

 basins hollowed in the living rock, and stocked 

 Avith elegant plants and animals, having all the 

 charm of novelty to his eye, they should have 

 moved his poetic fancy, and found more than 

 one place in the gorgeous imagery of his Orien- 

 tal romances. Just listen to him : — 



*P. 187. 



