A SCENE IN THE BRAZILIAN FOREST.

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A SCENE IN THE BRAZILIAN FOREST.

HABITATION OF AN INDIAN FAMILY.

ALL travellers who have penetrated into the interior of the South American continent, are lost in admiration of the gigantic scale in which the vegetable world luxuriates. Trees of vast size, embraced and pressed to death by creeping plants which rise above them with every variety of the most brilliant colours, alike tempt the curiosity and bid defiance to the exertions of the most enterprising intruder. As in equinoctial countries the mariner sees at one glance all the constellations of the northern and southern hemisphere, so nature has surrounded the inhabitants of the tropics with representatives of all the forms of vegetable life. In our northern climates the most beautiful flowers belong to humble plants or lowly shrubs, in these warm regions the loftiest trees produce the gayest flowers in wild luxuriance, the very grasses assume the form and size of trees. One of the most singular features of the scene is afforded by the variety, the position and the colouring of the extraordinary parasitical plants and creepers that twist, and twine, and wreathe themselves in every direction, closing around the captive naturalist who would examine them more nearly, and protected by their poisonous juices, which by sad experience warn the lover of science not to grasp too rudely the object of his search. These singular plants sometimes resemble leafless ropes, (as the bauhinias, often forty feet in length,) which, singly or doubly twisted, stretch like cables from the trunks and branches of the primæval forests, down to the ground, in which they take firm root, other cords or thinner strings hang down, which have not yet reached the ground, but wave to and fro, following the movements of the foliage to which they are attached. Another species, itself in size a tree, more mighty than the giant of the forest which it clasps, and surpassing it in vitality, becomes the deadly enemy of its former supporter. In bold and fantastic wreath it girdles the juicy laurel-tree, or the vast bertholletia, and extending itself from year to year over the patient tree, it threatens it with destruction. Another vast creeper has already effected its object; the vanquished tree, the circulation of the sap thus impeded, soon rots, and thus falling on one side, stands, like an adventurous spectre, leaning or rather hanging awry in the mouldering obscurity of the forest. The excited fancy beholds in these excrescences of vegetable life, as it were, gigantic serpents, or other voracious monsters in this gloomy solitude. And, indeed, no

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species seems to deviate so much from the peaceful habits of the vegetable kingdom, as these deadly lianas, that seem at first only to seek for sustenance for their quiet neighbours, then expanding voraciously over their surface, closing round them more and more firmly, they deprive them of their vital sap. The development of this kind of creepers is very singular. At first they grow perpendicular as weak shrubs, but as soon as they obtain any support from another tree, they abandon their former mode of existence and become parasites, conforming exactly to the surface of the strange trunk, and seek their nourishment almost exclusively from it, receiving scarcely any from their own root. Instead of expanding concentrically in all directions, as is the general laws of stems like theirs, they display, whenever they are irritated by contact, an inclination almost instinctive, as it were, to get rid of their bark, and by degrees to expand equally over a heterogeneous body, like a fluid. The very branches of these parasite gradually lose their individuality. The strength of the original root is thus weakened, but the stem repairs this loss, by sending new roots (air-roots) downwards till they reach the ground, and thus this family, tough and tenacious of life, acquires new expansion and strength at the expense of their neighbours. Large flowers richly coloured, and a brilliant, juicy green foliage are distinguishing peculiarities of many plants of this singular species, and where they appear in masses, inoculating, as it were, other trunks and tree-summits with a foreign foliage, they produce a great effect in the chiaroscuro of a tropical forest. These creepers, as well as the hostile parasites, which, in common with them often cover and finally destroy the largest trees, frequently emit coloured or milky juices which have the effect of a sharp or deadening poison, and are but seldom innoxious. It is therefore a dangerous undertaking to penetrate into the windings of these bushy cables, a wound from the noxious juice produces painful swelling of the limbs, and if it should chance to drop into the eye, blindness frequently ensues. Hence it is that the botanist has but rarely an opportunity to study at leisure these extraordinary plants, for they have been but seldom seen with leaves, flowers or fruits, and it is almost impossible to penetrate the thick and complicated intricacies of the pendant formations. And when the liana displays its leaves and blossoms at a giddy height, near the summit of the mighty tree-which only the linx-eyed Indian can discover, there are no means of attaining it; for even the boldest son of the desert fears the evil exhalations and the juices of the creeper, to which he otherwise could climb with ready ease, as it even requires the united force of many more to produce the least motion in this outstretched airy tent of parasite foliage. Even the terrible hurricanes of the tropics exert their force in vain.

There are likewise other plants which form themselves into hedges, or twine amidst the underwood of the forest, and their fiery-coloured and aromatic blossoms invest

A SCENE IN THE BRAZILIAN. FOREST.

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the country with that character of fulness and richness, so peculiar to the tropies. Who can name all these revelling children of a creative sun, whose immense expansive flowers shine like stars in the foliage, and wind and wreathe into festoons and garlands, amidst which the cheerful choristers of the woods conceal themselves? We omit here the description of the palm tree, and the other trees, vast in extent, and of universal use in the economy of the poor Indians who inhabit these regions. But we cannot refrain from borrowing the appropriate remarks from a deservedly popular work, which will serve to convey in lively terms the general effect of these magnificent scenes. "Go see the full beauty of an equinoctial forest, it is necessary for the traveller to bury himself in its deep recesses; there, instead of the fatiguing monotony of our European oaks and firs, every tree has a character of its own, each has its peculiar foliage, and probably also a tint unlike that of the trees which surround it. Gigantic vegetables of the most different families intermix their branches; five-leaved bignonias grow by the side of bonduc trees; cassias shed their yellow blossoms upon the rich fronds of arborescent ferns; myrtles and eugenias, with their thousand arms, contrast with the elegant simplicity of palms; and among the airy foliage of the mimosa, the cecropia elevates its giant leaves and heavy candelabra-shaped branches. With us, the oak, the chesnut, and the beech, scem as if they bore no flowers, so small are they, and so little distinguishable, except by naturalists; but in the forests of South America the cassias hang down their pendants of golden blossoms, and lofty trees contribute their flowers of all colours and sizes to diversify the scene."

The great traveller, Humboldt has well described the difficulties of the naturalist in this tempting wealth of nature, and the indolence of the Indians, whose simple life and quick dexterity, when they choose to exert it for their own amusement, are pourtrayed in the plate before us. "We have seen, in two years, above twentyseven different kinds of palms in South America. How many must not the travellers of all nations have observed in their wide wanderings, and yet the European systems scarcely distinguish from fourteen to eighteen species systematically described. The difficulty is really greater than can be imagined. We have felt it the more, as we have chiefly directed our attention to palms, grasses, and other objects which have been hitherto neglected. The former blossom only once a year, near the equator, in the months of January and February. Has the traveller it in his power to pass these two months in regions rich in palms? The blossom of many lasts but a few days, so that one almost always comes too late. In districts extending several thousand square miles, we often find but three or four species of palms. Who, in the blossoming months, can be at the same time. in the palmy missions at the Rio Carony, in the Morichales at the mouth of the

Orinsco, in the valley of Caura, and Erevato, on the banks of the Atabapo and Rio Negro, or on the slope of the Duida. And then the difficulty of reaching the palm blossoms, which hang down in thick forests or on marshy banks, from a height of sixty feet, with stems armed with dangerous thorns. When an European prepares himself for a botanical travel, he dreams of scissors and crooked knives, which, fastened to poles, bring down all within their reach, and of boys who climb the highest trees with their feet fastened by a rope. Almost all these dreams, alas! remain unfulfilled. In Guayana we are among Indians whom their poverty and want of civilization make rich and free from wants, so that neither gold nor promises can induce them to go a yard out of their path, This unconquerable apathy of the Indians enrages an European the more, as he sees this race, with incredible ease, ascend wherever their wishes lead them; for instance, to reach an ape which, wounded by an arrow, saves itself from falling by its prehensory tail. Around Havannah, near the town, in the month of January, all the stems of the palma real (royal palm) in the public walks, and the neighbouring plains, were covered with snow-white flowers. For several days, we offered every negro boy whom we met in the streets of Regla, or Guanavacoa, two Spanish dollars for a branch of male flowers. In vain. No free man will submit to any continued labour in the tropics, unless compelled to it by extreme necessity."

To conclude, in the words of the same distinguished traveller." It were an undertaking worthy a great artist to study the character of the vegetable world of South America, not in the description of the botanist, but in the grandeur of 'tropical nature itself. How interesting and instructive for the landscape painter would be a work which should first represent to the eye, singly, the chief forms of those tropical vegetable groups, and then united in their contrast with each other. What is more picturesque than tree-like ferns which spread their tenderly woven. leaves over the laurel oak. What more charming than pisang-bushes shaded by lofty bamboo grasses. For to the artist it is given to dissect the groups, and under his hand the great magic picture of nature dissolves itself, like the written works of men, into a few simple signs."