40 NOTES OF A BOTANIST 
boat has been floating lazily on the water, under a 
burning and dazzling sun, with not a breath of air 
stirring, I have sometimes — as my eye wandered 
along the endless forest-margin — given vent to 
some such exclamation as this : " How tame and 
monotonous ! was there ever seen elsewhere a 
mass of foliage of such wearisome sameness ! " 
when the coming on of a squall, by simply reveal- 
ing the glowing tints of the underside of the leaves, 
has in a moment waked up the scene into life and 
beauty. 
The Flowers of the Tropical Forests 
And now a word about the flowers. Were a 
naturalist to combine into one glowing description 
all the gay flowers, butterflies, and birds he had 
observed in any part of the Amazon valley, during 
a whole year, he might no doubt produce a most 
fascinating picture ; which would, however, utterly 
mislead his readers, if they were thereby led to 
suppose that even a tithe of those beautiful objects 
were ever to be seen all together, or in the space 
of a single day. Very much depends on seeing 
any particular site exactly at the time when its 
most showy plants, insects, or birds are in greatest 
perfection or profusion ; and the effect is always 
modified by the peculiar tastes of the observer. 
To the naturalist, the mere fact of an object's 
being new^ and strange invests it with a con- 
ventional beauty, independent of all aesthetic con- 
siderations ; and for myself I must confess that, 
although a passionate admirer of beauty of form 
and colour, and with a most sensual relish of 
