THE EQUINOCTIAL ZONE. 49 



of climbing plants, taking root in the ground, at 

 first twine up the trunks and branches, and 

 afterwards, forsaking their parent soil, continue 

 to grow up as parasites. The stems of some of 

 these climbers have a singular inclination to 

 throw off their bark whenever they are irri- 

 tated by contact, and spread themselves upon 

 the substance of the foreign body ; thus, the 

 branches of the parasite by degrees coalesce, 

 and the strength of the original root being 

 weakened, the stem sends down air roots, and 

 thus continually gains fresh strength and space. 

 On the banks of the Rio Guama, Martins saw 

 whole rows of a species of palm, so overgrown 

 by one of these climbers, that the parasite had 

 formed around the trunk (which was thirty 

 feet high) a cylindrical tube, which bore leaves 

 and flowers on short branches, and from the top 

 of which rose the noble crown of the palm. In 

 the forests of South America, some of these 

 climbers form living ropes, or rattan cables, 

 which produce neither leaves nor flowers for a 

 length of thirty or forty feet ; and in the Asiatic 

 forests similar ropes are formed by various 

 species of passion-flower and rattan canes, 

 (Calamus,) and these bind the trees together 

 with such power, that the strongest hurricane 

 cannot tear them asunder. So luxuriant and 

 profuse is the vegetation of these regions, that 

 even from the roots of the trees spring up 

 a variety of plants, often of gigantic size and of 

 singular form. 



The Rafflesice, etc., of the Indian Archipelago, 

 5 



