


Igor | BRIEFER ARTICLES 353 
Paulo. ‘To any one who has seen Ceylonese, Javanese, or even 
Hawaiian coffee plantations, the Brazilian method of culture will be in 
striking contrast, as no shade trees are employed. The sight of 
thousands of acres of any perennial plant is impressive, but a planta- 
tion of 770,000 trees of coffee, loaded with dark red berries, is really 
beautiful as well as impressive. 
The Brazilian coffee soil is more like New Jersey red clay than any 
other American soils I know, but it breaks up into an impalpable 
powder and rises in brick-red clouds about the horses and wagons 
driving through the plantation, and stains every thing a bright red 
that is very difficult to remove. To a man of fastidious tastes this 
choking, sticky dust would be a decided drawback to life on a 
Brazilian coffee estate. 
From the railway station, the party were driven several miles 
through a broad stretch of coffee trees, and in the very heart of the 
plantation found a bit of virgin forest several acres in extent, that had 
been spared the axe, to show how nature clothed that fair land in the 
days when coffee had no market value. Under the monster trees we 
passed, marveling at their size and beauty, until without a word of 
warning we found ourselves in the presence of two giant trees towering 
above the lesser giants as those would tower above our grandest elms 
and oaks. It has never been my fortune to stand beneath such 
majestic forms of plant life as these Jequitiba trees of the Brazilian 
jungle. The largest specimen measured nearly sixty- two feet in cir- 
cumference six feet above the ground, or over twenty feet in diameter. 
Its height was unknown, but certainly exceeded two hundred and fifty 
feet. The trunk was covered with a regular clear gray bark, and was as 
columnar as if taken from a Grecian temple, tapering very gradually 
to the immense crown of spreading branches. Nothing could have 
given a better idea of the magnitude of this crown than one of the 
fallen branches which lay like a large tree trunk on the ground, meas- 
uring at least four feet in diameter and fifty feet in length. From 
beneath, we could see that in this tree top a veritable forest of epi- 
phytes and parasites was growing, which added very much to its 
graceful outlines. 
These Jequitiba trees, I believe, challenge the world for majesty of 
size and form. They are certainly more beautiful than the slender, 
spire-like Eucalyptus of Gypsland, Victoria; their crowns are far more 
picturesque than those of the Kauri gums (Jammary) of New Zealand, 
