142 humboldt's cuba. 



marks the humid places, and we might believe that 

 the entire island was originally a forest of palms 

 and wild lime, and orange trees. These last, which 

 have a small fruit, are probably anterior to the 

 arrival of the Europeans, 1 who carried there the 

 agrumi of the gardens, which rarely exceed ten or 

 fifteen feet in height. 



The lime and the orange do not usually grow 

 together, and when the new settlers clear the land 

 they distinguish the quality of the soil according as 

 it bears one or other of these social plants ; and the 

 soil that bears the orange is preferred to that which 

 produces the small lime. In a country where the 

 operations of the sugar plantations have not been so 

 well perfected that they need no other fuel than the 

 hagass, this progressive destruction of the small 

 clumps of wood is a real calamity. The arid nature 

 of the soil is increased in proportion as it is stripped 

 of the trees which serve to shield it from the hot rays 

 of the sun, and whose leaves radiating their caloric 



1 The well-informed inhabitants state, with pride, that the culti- 

 vated orange brought from Asia preserves its size and all the pro- 

 perties of its fruit when it becomes wild. (This also is the opinion 

 of Senor Gallesio.— " Traite du Citrus,' 7 p. 32). The Brazilians do 

 not doubt that the small bitter orange, which bears the name of 

 naranjo do terra, and is found wild far from the habitations, is of 

 American origin. — CaldcleugWs Travels in South America, vol. L 

 p. 25. — H. 



