THE ATLANTIC COAST AND ITS CONNECTIONS. 49 
tropics, — this entire absence of sod; but so dense is the 
upper foliage that there is no chance for small plants 
below, except such as can, like the sarsaparilla, climb 
up into the light above, or orchids, like the vanilla, 
which cling to, if they do not draw a part of their sus¬ 
tenance from, the tree-stems. The cohune palm (Attalea 
colmne , Martins.) was abundant, and by its presence con¬ 
firmed the testimony of the dark chocolate soil ,to the 
exceeding fertility of the land. This palm seems to have 
three names applied to as many stages of growth. When 
young and stemless, it is manaca; in middle age, when 
the bases of the old leaves still cling to the trunk, it is 
colmne; and when age removes these scales, the smooth 
stem is corozo. I have never seen the manaca in flower or 
fruit, but I believe the three are but one species. Other 
palms were intermingled with these, — some in blossom, 
some in fruit,—but none so common nor so large, both 
in stem and leaf. Later on we shall see a picture of the 
cohune and its very valuable fruit. 
In one place along the bank I measured fourteen feet of 
soil of the best quality; nor was this surprising, since the 
valley through which the Rio Chocon flows is a catch-basin 
for the detritus of the limestone ranges of the Sarstun and 
Santa Cruz mountains, and its form guards against tor¬ 
rential floods which might wash away the rich deposit. 
When the summer rains flood the banks, as we found 
later, the water subsides in a few hours, owing to the 
wide-open lower course of the river. 
A gigantic ceiba-tree (. Eriodendron ) stood not far from 
the river, and two of its great buttresses enclosed a semi¬ 
circle thirty feet in diameter, while the projections them¬ 
selves were not half a foot thick. Trees of very various 
4 
