CHAP. I THE EQUATORIAL FORESTS 37 
wondrous diversity of forms, two trees of the same 
species scarcely ever growing side by side. And 
yet the types of foliage are often very few, rendering 
the tout ensemble exceedingly monotonous ; for the 
leaves of a large proportion of Amazon trees are 
ovate or lanceolate, leathery, smooth, and entire at 
the margins. The Laurel type — lanceolate, glossy, 
entire leaves, with few acute curved veins anasto- 
mosing far within the margin, whereof our Sweet 
Bay may be cited as an example — abounds in the 
Amazon valley, and includes not only the leaves of 
all true Laurels, and of scattered species of various 
other orders, but also the leaflets of many pinnated 
leaves. It has been sometimes as rare a treat to 
me to see a deeply-divided leaf as a deeply-furrowed 
bark ; strongly cut, jagged, or sinuated leaves, such 
as those of our hollies, hawthorns, maples, oaks, etc., 
being seldom met with on the forest trees. A few 
trees, however, chiefly of humble or moderate size, 
such as the Papaws and Cecropias, have enormous 
leaves, lobed or deeply cloven into finger-like divi- 
sions. Others have, like our horse-chestnut, several 
leaflets (five, seven, or nine) springing from the apex 
of a common foot-stalk ; and these are some of the 
noblest trees of the forest — Silk-cottons (Bombax, 
Eriodendron, Ochroma), Bow-wood trees (Tecoma), 
_etc. The leaflets are reduced to three in the India- 
rubber trees (Siphonia), the Souari-nut trees (Caryo- 
car), and in a multitude of Papilionaceous and 
Bignoniaceous lianas ; although in the latter the 
middle leaflet is often replaced by a tendril. Lobed 
or jagged leaves or leaflets are less rare among 
lianas, especially the herbaceous ones ; thus they 
exist in many Gourd-plants, Passion-flowers, and in 
