TRAVELS IN BRAZIL. 



99 



\ 



a conflagration which lasted seven years.* Many of 

 the birds pecuKar to the island were perhaps de- 

 stroyed on this occasion. Dragon trees (^Draccena 

 draco) of the same kind as the ancient tree at 

 Orotava, in TenerifFe, are seldom seen here, and 

 only singly in the gardens. Cultivation has since 

 contributed to banish the native species, and to 

 introduce foreign ones. However, the greatest 

 affinity with the plants of the Canary Islands is still 

 evident ; and the several zones of vegetation may 

 be properly characterised, in the same manner as 

 Von Buchhas done for those islands. We do not, 

 however, distinguish five different zones, above one 

 another, but only four, the two lowest of which 

 are determined by the peculiarity of the cultivation, 

 and the two higher by the natural state of the ve- 

 getation, t 



Loaded with the treasures of all kinds which we 

 had collected, but exhausted by our great exertions, 

 we returned to the town late in the evening, by a 

 road made between the vineyards. Though the 

 heat, increased by the black basalt rock, had been 

 very oppressive during this excursion, the therm o- 



* Lemos Faria e Castro Historia, vol. vi. p. 183. The ancient 

 historians all agree that the first donataries, descendants of 

 Zarco, took the name of Camaras, from a cave in which he had 

 found many sea-wolves {lobos marmhos), and which he there- 

 fore called Camara dos lobos. If they were really sea-lions 

 which then frequented the coast of Madeira, it is remarkable 

 that no traces of this animal are now to be found there. 



f See Note 2. page 126. 



H 2 



1 



