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To the north of the pinelands and extending northward to the 
base of the hills lie the rich tobacco lands of the Vuelta Abajo, 
highly cultivated and their original flora mostly long ago exter- 
minated, except in limited isolated patches. Groups of royal 
palms and of the palma cafia (Sabal) remain, and with them 
enough species of other plants to show that their primaeval flora 
was widely different from that of pinelands or low savannas. 
Hilly pinelands and oaklands on shaly soil succeed the tobacco 
lands; the numerous streams have cut them into deep broad 
arroyos; in the bottoms of these valleys shrubs and trees grow 
in large variety, many of them the same as those observed along 
the streams at Herradura, but each little valley visited contained 
some species different from those found before, and we by no 
means exhausted their botanical possibilities. A most striking 
floral feature of the pinelands near the Guane road, on the Sierra 
de Cabra, at about 800 feet altitude, is the red-flowered shrub 
Befaria, related to our rhododendrons, abundant there, but not 
seen elsewhere by us. 
In order to obtain a convenient stopping place from which to 
study the flora of the limestone sierras, and that of the country 
between them and the northern coast, we drove on rine er 
12 to the Bafios San Vicente, where there is more sulphur water, 
and remained there until September 17. Hilly aide exten 
north nearly to Vifiales, with an outcropping ledge of limestone 
onthe way. Coming into the fertile valley of Vifiales the craggy 
limestone masses of the sierra almost burst into view, and for 
the next fifteen kilometers the road affords mountain scenery as 
picturesque and attractive as one could wish to see; long and 
short, high and low, but invariably steep hills and mountains 
are all about, rising abruptly, and clothed luxuriantly with a 
varied tropical vegetation; to lovers of natural beauty this drive 
alone is worth all the time required for a trip to Cuba, but being 
quite off the line of tourist travel, the region is little visited. 
In places the cliffs are nearly vertical to a height of 700 feet 
or more. Ascent may be made here and there on the talus of 
broken rock and up some of the valleys, but the limestone is so 
rough and jagged (termed diente-perro by the Cubans) that 
