7B 



VEGETATION OF NEW ANDALUSIA. 



Slnpralnr 

 lupect of 

 uuture. 



CHAP. VII. less silvery according as the soil was dry or marshy, and 

 Cecroj^ specimens occurred in which they were entirely green 

 on both sides. The roots of these shrubs were concealed 

 beneath tufts of dcrstenia, a plant which thrives only in 

 shady and moist places. In the midst of the forest they 

 found i)Hpaws and orange-trees bearing excellent fruit, 

 which they conjectured to be the remains of some 

 Indian plantations ; as in these countries they are no 

 more indigenous than the banana, the maize, the 

 manioc, and the many other useful plants whose native 

 country is unknown, although they have accompanied 

 man in his migrations from the most remote periods. 



" When a traveller newly arrived from Europe," 

 says Humboldt, " penetrates for the first time into the 

 forests of South America, Nature presents herself to his 

 view in an unexpected aspect ; the objects by which he is 

 surrounded bear but a faint resemblance to the pictures 

 drawn by celebrated writers on the banks of the Missis- 

 sippi, in Florida, and in other temperate regions of the 

 New World. He perceives at every step, that he is not 

 upon the verge, but in the centre of the torrid zone, — 

 not in one of the West India islands, but upon a vast 

 continent, where the mountains, the rivers, the mass of 

 vegetation, and every thing else, are gigantic. If he be 

 sensible to the beauties of rural scenery, he finds it 

 difficult to account to himself for the diversified feelings 

 which he experiences: lie is unable to determine what 

 most excites his admiration ; whether the solemn silence 

 of the wilderness, or the individual ])eauty and contrajst 

 of the forms, or the vigour and freshness of vegetable 

 life that characterize the climate of the tropics. It 

 might be said that the earth, overloaded with plants, 

 does not leave them room enough for growth. The 

 trunks of tlie trees are every where covered with a 

 tliick carpet of verdure ; and were the orchides and the 

 plants of the genera Piper and Pothos, which grow 

 uptin a single courbarij or American fig-tree, transferred 

 to tlie ground, tliey would cover a large space. By 

 thia singular dcnseriess of vegetation, the forests, like 



.Vnnce of 

 ulini ration. 



