NLV. Vui^K 

 BOI ANICAL 



TORRE Y A ""^""^ 



Vol. 25 No. 4 



July- August, 1925 



SKETCHES ()[<' TRAVI':L IN SOUTH a]vii:rica— 

 THE ASCENT Ol' (()!<( OVA DO 



William A. Murrill 



The weather being perfect on Monday, January 28, I decided 

 to devote the afternoon to Corcovado, which is 2,300 feet high 

 and gives a superb view of Rio and the surrounding country. 

 Leaving the "Van Dyck" as soon as lunch was over, I took a 

 trolley car at the Hotel Avenida marked "Aguas Ferreas," 

 which landed me in thirty minutes at the Cosme Velho station 

 at the base of the mountain. Here I found an electric cogwheel 

 train waiting and we were soon on our way up the steep incline, 

 winding in and out among lofty cliffs covered with ferns and 

 catching beautiful glimpses of the forested slopes and the city 

 below. The railway is two miles long, with a maximum grade 

 of 30 degrees. A return ticket costs 3 mil reis, — a little over 

 30 cents, — and allows stop-overs at Sylvestre and Paineiras, 

 where there are refreshments and hotel accommodations. At 

 the latter station, I took an interesting walk through the woods, 

 examining the plants at close range and making some collections. 

 The ferns claimed my chief attention, because of their abundance, 

 variety, and beauty. The only species seen that occur as far 

 north as the Carolinas were the bracken {Pteris) and the resur- 

 rection fern {Poly podium incanum). I saw also one species of 

 sphagnum moss and several beds of the hair-cap moss (Poly- 

 trichum) which resembled our own. On a dead stump were 

 large masses of the tropical tree-destroying punk-fungus. Fames 

 Auberianus, first known from Cuba, where I myself have fre- 

 quently collected it; while nearby on a pile of decaying trash 

 was one of the prettiest little species of Lepiota I ever saw, the 

 shapely, purplish caps growing in clusters of three or four, united 

 by purplish cords. Needless to say, I made a good collection of 

 these for the Garden herbarium. 



The summit of the mountain is reached after a short raihvav 

 journey from Paineiras and a climb of 1 15 feet to the observation 

 pavilion. As I went up the steps, with one of the finest views 

 in the whole world just ahead of me, I could not help noticing a 



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