Natural Sciences of Philadelphia 
17 
of the upper forest, above which they stood like sentinels, were the 
wax palms—one of the handsomest of its group and one peculiar 
to the mountains of this portion of tropical America. 
This region was a most interesting one to study, with much in 
it not encountered above or below, and a difficult type of country 
to examine on account of the tangled forest and its generally sat¬ 
urated condition, aside from the steepness of the slopes. The 
bromeliads alone yielded much of interest in the way of insects 
which, either habitually or occasionally, seek shelter between their 
leaves. Remarkable frogs, and even a species of salamander, live in 
the wet pockets at the leaf bases, specimens of these, as well as the 
eggs of the frog, having been secured by our party. 
At an elevation of seventy-nine hundred feet the forest ceases 
and above this we have a virtually treeless bald, except for pro¬ 
tected ravines, up which the timber creeps. Here we have a region 
covered waist to shoulder high with a dense tangle of bracken, 
thorny berry vines and low perennials, with many beautiful 
annuals, which suggested more temperate climes than Colombia. 
The dominant feature of the vegetation, however, was the great 
abundance of large ground bromeliads, to which we applied our¬ 
selves with a machete and enthusiasm. Previous information 
was to the effect that certain very desirable species of cockroaches 
(Blattidae) lived in these plants, and we secured not only greatly 
desired material of these, but also most valuable data on their im¬ 
mature stages, abundance of notes upon other insects living in these 
strange homes, and also upon the frogs with similar proclivities. 
Many other insects were taken and our gasolene lights, which had 
been most carefully transported to this out-of-the-way place, yield¬ 
ed a remarkable catch of moths on one of the nights spent there. 
A few rods from our camp the mountain range broke off abruptly 
to the south, dropping down thousands of feet, in sheer cliffs, to 
the great valleys which separate the San Lorenzo range from the 
ridges which roll up to the grand culmination of the Sierra Nevada 
itself. Many times we looked for the snow peaks, while we were 
on San Lorenzo, but the cloud masses of the rainy season were jeal¬ 
ous guardians and only quite early in the morning could one get 
a view of their superb grandeur. Then the indescribable mag¬ 
nificence of the trinity of snow-covered pyramids, with the light 
play of the rising sun upon them, would be revealed. Thirty miles 
away this wonderful group stood out serene and glorious, above a 
