CHAPTER V. 
THE VEGETATION OF THE VIRGIN-FOREST OF THE AMAZON AND THE 
MADEIRA. 
rEEYWHEEE the decom- 
posing organisms serve 
as bases for new for- 
mations. No particle, 
liowever small, is ever lost 
in tlie great honsebold of 
Nature ; but nowbcre is 
her restless activity so con- 
spicuous as in the ti'opics, 
where the succession of 
vegetable decay and life is 
so much more rapid than 
it is in colder climes; and 
which will strike the re- 
flecting student more csxiccially in the wide, forest-clad A'^alleys of 
tropical America, and on the Amazon and its affluents. 
On the heights of the Cordillera, the process is already at work. 
The waste of the mountain-slopes, broken off by rills and toircnts, 
and carried by them into the main river, slowly drifts down stream 
in the form of gravel-banks, until, scattered and rent asunder in a. 
thousand ways, it filially takes permanent form as light green islands, 
which are soon covered and protected Mitli a dense coat of vegetation. 
(T^ 
Cliaiiges and Now Formations. — 
Terras Cohidas. — Orchids and 
Bromelife. — Lianas. — Figueiras. 
— Palms. — The Caoutchouc. — 
The Cacao. — Drugs. — ^Resins. — 
The Urary. — The Quinquina. — 
The Guarana. — The Coca. 
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