236 NATURAL HISTORY OF 



ing down a number of large trees as if they had been so many 

 straws. After walking along the top of a steep bank, on 

 which many coffee-bushes in different stages of fruit were 

 growing, we penetrated a little way into one of the woods, 

 following a narrow path which ran alongside a small stream, 

 in which were many small frogs. On the margin of this rill 

 a very pretty pink-flowered Begonia, and a variety of other 

 plants, were common. Among the bushes near the entrance 

 of the wood a little yellow finch, much like a canary in 

 general appearance, was hopping out in numbers ; and another 

 small bird, resembling a sparrow, was also abundant. Two 

 parrots flew screaming through the air over our heads, and 

 we saw an exquisite little green humming-bird sucking the 

 flowers of a tall composite plant. In the woods the luxu- 

 riance of the vegetation was very wonderful. I was much 

 struck by the great height, as compared with the slenderness, 

 of many of the trees, not a few towering up for thirty or forty 

 feet before giving off a single branch, as well as by the variety 

 of remarkable forms presented to our gaze, including palms of 

 several species ; Garicas, with their characteristic scarred 

 stems, large deeply-lobed leaves, and oblong yellow fruits ; 

 Cecropias ; Tree-ferns, with tiaras of delicate green minutely 

 cut fronds ; and gigantic Leguminosm. A huge tree, appa- 

 rently belonging to the last order, which grew in a hollow 

 in the neighbourhood of the house, presented a most extra- 

 ordinary appearance : the stem, dividing at a distance of 

 about ten or twelve feet from the ground into immense ver- 

 tical folds which extended outwards and downwards on every 

 side, subdividing in such a manner as to form a number of 

 sloping walls from six to eight feet high, though but little more 

 than two or three inches thick, with interspaces between 



