INTRODUCTION® 
XIX 
furrounded with an Orange grove : this hill, whole 
bafe was walhed on one fide by the floods of the 
Mufquitoe river, and on the other fide by the bil- 
lows of the ocean, was about one hundred yards 
diameter, 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 foreft of the Agave vivi- 
para (though compofed of herbaceous plants, I 
term it a foreft, becaufe their fcapes or flower- 
items arofe eredt near 30 feet high) : their tops re- 
gularly branching in the form of a pyramidal tree, 
and thefe plants growing near to each other, occu- 
pied a fpace of ground of feveral 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 them- 
felves in the fand : the plant grows to a prodigious 
fize before the fcape ftioots up from its centre. 
Having contemplated this admirable grove, I pro- 
ceeded towards the fhrubberies on the banks of the 
river, and though it was now late in December, 
the aromatic groves appeared in full bloom. The 
broad-leaved fweet Myrtus, Erythrina coralloden- 
drum, Cadtus cochinellifer, Cacalia fuftruticofa, and 
particularly, Rhizophora conjugata, which flood 
dole to and in the fait water of the river, were in 
full bloom? with beautiful white fweet Rented flowers, 
which attradled to them two or three fpecies of very 
beautiful butterflies, one of which was black, the 
upper pair of its wings very long and narrow, 
marked with tranfverfe ftripes of pale yellow 7 , with 
feme fpots of a crimfon colour near the body. Ano- 
ther fpecies remarkable for fplendour, was of a larger 
fize ; the wings were undulated and obtufely cre- 
mated round their ends, the nether pair terminating 
pear the body, with a long narrow forked tail ; the 
ground 
