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thickets. Several of the most beautiful are employ- 

 ed to decorate the treliices of gardens. Among 

 others, the copiu deserves to be noticed ; its flowers, 

 each of which is composed of six petals, three inches 

 in length, are of the most beautiful crimson, spotted 

 within with v/hite. This plant climbs up the highest 

 trees; its leaves are disposed by threes, and are of a 

 beautiful green, and an oval shape; the fruit is an 

 inch in diameter, cylindrical, of a dull yellow, and 

 contains a white tender pulp of a sweet and pleasant 

 taste. In Chili is likewise found the passion-flower 

 (passiflora tilice folia) the caracol, the sarsaparilla, 

 the alstroemeria salsilla, and four or five other species 

 of those vines called by the French lianes, and by 

 the inhabitants voqm. One of the most useful is the 

 cogul (dolichos funarius). The vine is round and 

 ligneous, and of the size of pack-thread, and its 

 flowers resemble those of the copiù. It climbs upon 

 the trees like the iv}^, but without attaching itself to 

 them. When it reaches the top of a tree, it descends 

 from it perpendicularly, and as it continues to grow 

 extends itself from tree to tree, until at length it 

 offers to the eye a confused tissue, exhibiting some 

 resemblance to the rigging of a ship. This singular 

 plant produces a leguminous flower of a purple 

 colour; its pod is an inch thick, and about a foot 

 and a half long ; it contains an oily pulp of a sweet 

 and very agreeable taste, and five seeds resembling 

 those of the cotton. The vine, which is much 

 tougher and more flexible than osier, serves for 

 many purposes, and can be procured. from one to 

 two hundred fathoms in length, as when it descends 



