12 BOTANICAL GAZETTE | JANUARY 
tation we may also find in our own northern one, only they are 
here much more faint and rare. 
The first vegetation formation 1 wish to speak of is the /for- 
est. The uniformity of climate in respect to the moisture, espe- 
cially of the soil, gives to the forest its stamp. 
At a distance the tropical forests are like our own northern 
forests of foliiferous trees, possessing the same mellow and 
rounded outlines, but the foliage is differently colored, which seems 
only natural in consequence of the many different species. 
Further, the trees are all of a much darker hue than those of 
ours; at all events, I have never seen a tropical forest with 
those fresh, bright green colors, that we love and admire in our 
own birch and beech woods in spring. This difference in col- 
oring is easily understood. The everlasting summer of the 
tropics and the unceasing development of ‘tropical nature have 
been very often spoken and written about. Bates says: ‘‘ There 
is neither spring, nor summer, nor autumn, but every day is a com- 
bination of them all.” Really he is partly right. To be sure, 
the stamp of death or sleep impressed upon our woods of foli- 
iferous trees by the winter is unknown in the tropics, where the 
trees, on account of the uniformity of the climate, are mostly 
evergreen (except a very few), as are our coniferous trees 
and also many of our small brushes and herbs even in Green- 
land. But we must not believe that life and development are of 
the very same intensity all the year round, so that every species 
of tree is getting new leaves, flowers, and fruits at all times of 
the year. With exception of a very few herbs, such an unceas- 
ing process of development is, according to my experience, not 
to be found anywhere. Near Lagoa Santa, at all events, every. 
species has its time of rest, and at distinct times for the differ- 
ent phases of life. . There is plainly a time of spring, namely, 
from August to October, and there is plainly a winter time; 
there is a settled leafing and a settled fall of the leaf ; but in 
this the tropical forest shows a great deviation from our woods 
of foliiferous trees. Our foliiferous trees unfold their leaves in 
May and lose them in October ; nearly six months the leaves 
