THE BEAUTY OF THE NIGHT 365 



In May and June several species of night bloom- 

 ing cereus blossom at dusk but they usually begin 

 to wither before sunrise. As a rule only the climb- 

 ing species do well here and two or three of these 

 have become naturalized. On a pine trunk in my 

 grounds a cereus, probably a hybrid, has sent 

 several strict stems to a height of fifty feet and I 

 have counted over twenty great flowers on it in 

 one night. Its sepals are rich brick red, the petals 

 satiny white, and it is exceedingly fragrant. On a 

 single plant of Cereus triangularis I have seen fifty 

 flowers each a foot in diameter and they trans- 

 formed the live oak on which the vine grew into 

 a miracle of beauty. No less than seventy-four of 

 these blossoms were seen very early one morning 

 on a plant which scrambled over an old rock pile. 



The delicious, spicy fragrance which saturates 

 the atmosphere of the hammock and even beyond 

 it comes from the marlberry {Icacorea paniculata), 

 a small tree which opens its clusters of pale, striped 

 flowers in the autumn. In the winter it bears at- 

 tractive purple berries which are much relished 

 by the birds. Some of the cultivated flowers are 

 also very fragrant at night. One of these (Acacia 

 farnesiana), a small native tree often grown in 



