338 CAMPS IN THE CARIBBEES. 
and lialines alone, the trunks would be barely visi- 
ble; but this is not all. Up their rough circumfer- 
ence creep vines and climbing-plants, clinging closely 
and firmly by multitudinous rootlets, hung with broad 
and pendulous leaves. Attached again to the vines 
and lianes are groups and clusters of epiphytic and 
parasitic plants, some like pine-apples, some large as 
cabbages, some like huge callas; and among them 
ferns and tillandsias, scores of species, piled, plant 
after plant, one above the other, in seeming confusion, 
each striving for a foothold in its aerial world. Now 
and then there will be a great spike of blossoms, crim- 
son, scarlet, or pure white, at which a humming-bird 
will dart, fluttering up and down, the whole scene 
reminding one of those lines in “ Evangeline,” where 
the vines — 
“ Hung their ladder of ropes aloft, like the ladder of Jacob, 
On whose pendulous stairs the angels, ascending, descending, 
Were the swift humming-birds, that flitted from blossom to blos- 
som.” 
No sound broke the solemn stillness of this moun- 
tain forest save the cooing of a distant wood-pigeon, 
and nothing showed itself except an occasional per- 
drix, or mountain partridge, as it flitted like a ghost 
across our path. Up and higher we ascended; the 
trees diminished in size, and there came to our ears 
the murmur of falling water, which we could not see, 
from the rankness of the vegetation. Balisters, or 
wild plantains, with broad green leaves and spikes of 
crimson and golden cups, now lined the trail, and 
glorious tree-ferns, in majesty of beauty unsurpassed, 
spread their leaves above them. 
We reached the stream, and found it warm —so 
