INTRODUCTION. 
xix 
fave its life, but to no effect. ! for by habit he had 
become infenfible to companion towards the brute 
creation : being now within a few yards of the 
harmlefs devoted victim, he fired, and laid it dead 
upon the body of the dam. 
If we beftow but very little attention to the eco- 
nomy of the animal creation, we (hall find manifeft 
examples of premeditation, perfeverance, refolu- 
tion, and confummate artifice, in order to effect 
their purpofes. The next morning, after the {laugh- 
ter of the bears, whilft my companions were link- 
ing our tent and preparing to re-embark, I refolved 
to make a little botanical excurfion alone : croffing 
over a narrow ifthmus of fand hills which feparated 
the river from the ocean, I palled over a pretty 
high hill, its fummit ciefled with a few palm trees, 
furrounded with an Orange grove : this hill, whofe 
bafe was warned on one fide by the floods of the 
Mufquito river, and on the other fide by the billows 
of the ocean, was about one hundred yards diame- 
ter, and feemed to be an entire heap of fea fhells. I 
continued along the beach a quarter of a mile, and 
came up to a foreir. of the Agave vivipara (though 
compofed of herbaceous plants, I term it a forefl, 
becaufe their fcapes or flower-items arofe erect near 
30 feet high) : their tops regularly branching in the 
form of a pyramidal tree, and thefe plants growing 
near to each other, occupied a fpace of ground 
of fever al acres : when their feeds are ripe they 
vegetate, and grow on the branches, until the fcape 
dries, when the young plants fall to the ground, 
take root, and fix themfelves in the fand : the plant 
grows to a prodigious fize before the fcape moots 
up from its centre. Having contemplated this ad- 
mirable grove, I proceeded towards the flirubberies 
on the banks of the river, and though it was now' 
Jate in December, the aromatic groves appeared in 
full 
