WANDERINGS IN 



birds resort for nourishment. It was to an indigested 

 seed, passing through the body of the bird which had 

 perched on the mora, that the fig-tree first owed its 

 elevated station there. The sap of the mora raised it 

 into fiill bearing ; but now, in its turn, it is doomed to 

 contribute a portion of its own sap and juices towards 

 the growth of different species of vines, the seeds of 

 which, also, the birds deposited on its branches. These 

 soon vegetate, and bear fruit in great quantities ; so what 

 with their usurpation of the resources of the fig-tree, and 

 the fig-tree of the mora, the mora, unable to support 

 a charge which nature never intended it should, lan- 

 guishes and dies under its burden ; and then the fig-tree, 

 and its usurping progeny of vines, receiving no more 

 succour from their late foster parent, droop and perish 

 in their turn. 



A vine called the bush-rope by the wood-cutters, on 

 account of its use in hauling out the heaviest timber, has 

 a singular appearance in the forests of Demerara. Some- 

 times you see it nearly as thick as a man's body, twisted 

 like a corkscrew round the tallest trees, and rearing its 

 head high above their tops. At other times, three or four 

 of them, like strands in a cable, join tree and tree, and 

 branch and branch together. Others^ descending from on 

 high, take root as soon as their extremity touches the 

 ground, and appear like shrouds and stays supporting 

 the mainmast of a line of battle ship ; while others. 



