Chap. VIII.— B. S.] CYRTODEIRA CHOXTALEXSIS. 117 
quainted with the vegetation of the district, we never 
met the plant anywhere hut there; and after we had 
taken up sixty specimens, and planted them in a mi¬ 
niature Wardian case, fire was set to the very spot 
where the Cyrtodeira grew, for the purpose of clearing 
it. The sixty specimens readily took root, and on our 
departure a hoy was engaged to carry them on his 
saddle before him to Leon, a distance of about eighty 
leagues. All went on well, till one evening darkness 
overtook us on the immense grassy plains of Tipitapa, 
and the hoy’s mule fell into one of those wide cracks 
which during the dry season in the tropics always form 
where the ground is clayey. Down came the Wardian 
case with a heavy crash, and one-half of our plants 
were lost. The other half looked well enough till 
within two miles of the port of embarkation, when the 
waggon in which, for greater safety’s sake, they had 
been placed, went into a deep hole, and turned right 
over. This time all hut six specimens were destroyed, 
and these were so much injured that when we arrived 
at London, and handed them to Mr.W. Bull, of Chelsea, 
the enterprising plant merchant, only one was found 
to he in a sound condition; hut that one has become 
the progenitor of a numerous race, which now orna¬ 
ments our hothouses. 
This little narrative shows what trouble the intro¬ 
duction of new plants requires, and how unforeseen 
accidents will interfere with well-devised plans, but it 
also reminds us of the changes constantly going on in 
the nature and aspect of the vegetation of the inha¬ 
bited globe, changes so great that it is almost as diffi- 
