Sugar-cane, Indigo, Cotton-tree, and Tobacco cover the cultivated plains. In Missouri, Texas, Arkansas, and Mexico, the great colony of the Cactuses arise into lofty stems. In this region Cactus opuntia, Cereus, Echinocactus, and Melocactus raise their oddly branching stems and clustering flowers. The most remarkable of all doubtless being Cereus giganteus. It inhabits the wildest and most inaccessible regions, requiring little or no soil to attain a prodigious development. It has at first the appearance of an enormous tomahawk. Thence rises a column, three yards high, which branches off and assumes the shape of an immense candelabrum, the height of which may be twelve or thirteen yards. Plate XXI. p. 494, is a representation of several Cactuses belonging to this region, from an original drawing by M. Bende, a French traveller in this country. Mexico, according to the reports of botanists, may be divided into three regions by its several latitudes. The first extends from the valleys as far as the Oak forests; this is the region of Palms, Cotton, Indigo, Sugar-cane, Coffee plant, and other fruits of the tropical zone. The second, situated at an elevation of six thousand feet above the sea, is the temperate region. It stretches from the Oak forests to the forests of Conifere. At this height the temperature is still sufficient to ripen some tropical fruits. The third, or cold region, occupies a space comprehended between the conifers and eternal snow. In many places it possesses a climate under which Pear, Apple, and Cherry trees, and the Potato, can still expand and ripen their fruits and tubers. In ascending from the foot of Orizaba, Mimosas, Acacias, Cotton trees, successively appear and disappear, to be replaced by the Convolvulus, Trumpet flowers, Oaks, Palms, Bananas, Myrtles, Laurels, Terebinthacee, Ferns, Magnolias, Arborescent-Ferns, Composites, Storax, Apples, Pears, Cherries, Apricots, Pome-Plane-trees, granates, Lemon and Orange trees, Orchids, Fuschias, and Cactuses.. known under the name of Llanos, In the plains of Venezuela, over which we propose to conduct the reader, we shall find in Von Alexander Humboldt a faithful and eloquent guide to the vegetation. “ We entered,” he says, “into the basin of the Llanos, the Mesa of Pesa, in 92° of latitude. The sun was nearly at its zenith;the earth, wherever it appeared, was sterile and destitute of was at 48° to 50° Cent.; not a breath;the temperaturevegetation

of wind was felt, as we rode upon our mules. Nevertheless, in the midst of this apparent calm, whirlwinds of dust. rose unceasingly, chased by little currents of air; which only skimmed the surface of the soil and raised the dust, giving birth to a difference of temperature between naked sandy places and those covered with vegetation, which rendered the former suffocating.” Through this atmosphere of quartz grains, dry fog, and banks of vapour, sometimes waving and sinuous, sometimes even-shaped, continues the learned traveller, “I saw naked trunks of palm-trees, destitute even of their crowning tuft of verdure. The trunks appear in the distance like the masts of ships on the horizon. There is something imposing, but sad and melancholy, in the uniform appearance of these steppes. Everything appears immovable; the shadow of a little cloud, which sometimes traverses the zenith, announcing the approach of the rainy season, is scarcely projected upon the savannah. The steppes are principally covered with graminaceous plants, such as Killengia, Cenchrus, and Paspalum. With these we find a few plants of the dicotyledonous class, such as the Turnera; some Malvacee, and, what is very remarkable, the little Mimosa pudia, / with ieaves quite sensitive to the touch, which the Spaniards call Dornuderas. The same race of cows which in Spain fatten upon sainfoin and clover, here find excellent nourishment in the herbaceous Sensitive plant. In the east, in the Llanos of Cairo and white Barcelona, the Cypura and Craniolaria, with their beautiful flowers, six to eight inches long, rise isolated among the graminaceous plants. The pasturage is fertile, not only near rivers subject to inundations, but also where the trunks of the palm-trees are most crowded, which is attributable to the shelter and protection which they give from the sun’s rays—which is the more remarkable, since the Palm of the Llanos (Corypha tectorum) has only very few corrugated and palmate leaves, like those of the Chamerops, the lower of which are always parched and dried up. Beside the isolated trunks of Palms we also find, here and there, in the Llanos, groups of Palms in which the Corypha mingles with a tree of the family of Proteacee—a new species of Rhopala, with hard and resonant leaves. In the Llanos of Caracas, the Corypha extends from the Mesade Paja to Guayaval. More to the north and northwest, it is replaced by another species of the same genus, with

leaves equally palmate, but much larger. To the south of Guayaval, other Palms predominate, chiefly the pinnate-leaved Piritu and the Mauritia Palm, the Sago-tree of America, which supplies farinaceous food, good wine, thread to weave into hammocks and clothes, and wands to make baskets; its fruit, in shape, resembling pine-cones, being covered with scales, like those of Calamus Rotang, with something of an apple taste. The Guaraous, whose very existence, so to speak, depends on the Murichi Palm (Mauritia flexuosa), obtain an acid and very refreshing fermented liquor from it. This Palm has large, shiny, corrugated, and fan-like leaves; maintaining a most beautiful verdure in times of the greatest drought. The sight of it alone in the Llanos produces an agreeable and refreshing sensation; and the Murichi, laden with its scaly fruit, contrasts singularly with the sad aspect of the Palm of Cobija, the leaves of which are always grey, and covered with dust.”

As we ascend from the low country of central America towards . the high ridges of the Cordilleras, whirlwinds of snow and hail succeed, each day, and for several hours, to the hot rays of the sun. If we ascend the Andes, between 20° south latitude and 5° north, at a height of from five thousand to nine thousand feet above the sea level, we shall find extra-tropical forms of vegetation become more abundant. The Graminacesw, some Amentacexe—such as the ks, Willows, the Labiates, Ericinee, numerous Composites, Caprifoliacee, Umbelliferee, Rosacew, Cruciferae, Ranunculaces. Tropical plants, on the contrary, disappear, or become very rare; but still, isolated species of Palms, Pepper plants, Cactuses, Passion flowers, and Melastoma, are found at considerable heights. Among the most abundant ligneous species is the Ceroxylon andicola, the highest of all the Palms, which reachs the height of one hundred and eighty feet and upwards, and produces a wax which exudes from its leaves, and from the base of their petioles. Humboldt’s Willow and Oak, several species of Cinchona and other Quinquinas, which here reign supreme; a few Hollies and Andromedas. Vegetables cultivated between the tropics, in Mexico, and as far south as the river Amazon, disappear almost entirely here;but Maize and Coffee, the cereals and European fruits, are cultivated in these regions; Potatoes; Chenopodium chinoa, the seeds of which, when: boiled, serve as food for the inhabitants of the mountains. ae Beats

If we ascend to the height of nine thousand feet above the sea on the Andes, and in the same latitude, tropical forms of vegetation almost entirely disappear. _ Those, on the contrary, which characterise temperate climates, and even of the polar regions, become abundant. Large trees are no longer seen. Alder bushes, Bilberries, Currants, Escallonia, with bitter and tonic leaves, of which this is the home; Hollies and Drymarias are bushes belonging to these regions, as well as the curious Calceolarias, with shoe-shaped corolla, the seeds of which have supplied horticulture with an infinite number of varieties. Amongst the characteristic families we also find Umbellifere, Caryophyllacee, Cruciferze, Cyperacexe, Mosses, and Lichens. Returning to more circumscribed vegetable districts, the climate of Caracas has often been called one of perpetual spring. A more delicious temperature cannot be conceived. During the day it ranges between 16° and 20° Cent., and in the night between 16° and 18°, with vegetative powers at once favourable to the growth of the Banana, the Orange, the Coffee shrub, the epi, oi is and Wheat.

We must not quit th two beneficent trees—the Theobroma cacao and the Cow-tree. -The roasted and crushed seeds of Theobroma cacao, with the addition of sugar, make chocolate. Humboldt gives the following account of the Cow-tree, which has much of the bearing of Chrysophyllum ainito. “The fruit, ” Humboldt tells us, “is rather fleshy, consisting of one, sometimes two nuts. When incisions are made in the trunk an abundance of thick glutinous milk flows, which is without any acidity. This substance exhales a very agreeable balsam-like odour. It was presented to us in the rit of the Calabash-tree. We drank considerable quantities of it in the evening before going to bed, and again early in the morning, without experiencing any injurious effects. Negroes and fires people who work in the plantations drink of it, and soak their bread, maize, or tapioca in it. The master of the farm assured us that the slaves fattened visibly during the season when the Palo de Vacca furnishes them with most milk. Upon the arid flank of a rock,” adds Von Humboldt, “there grows a tree whose leaves are dry and coriaceous, its great ligneous roots almost piercing the stone. During many months of the year not a shower waters its foliage, the

branches appear dry and dead; but when the trunk is pierced a sweet and nourishing milk follows the incision.”

Shall we now describe the wild beauties of the impenetrable forests of Guyana? take our walk in these immense savannahs, animated by Graminacex, by clusters of Myrtacex, magnificent Orchids and Melastoma, while elegant Palm-trees here and there arrange themselves in picturesque groups? or shall we rather navigate the tranquil waves of the quiet. Guyana, upon “ whose waters the splendid Victoria Regia spreads her broad leaves, while its magnificent flowers proclaim her queen of the Nymphaceze? In order to penetrate to the heart of the vegetation of Brazil, the region of Palms and Melastoma, this land of promise to naturalists, we shall again take as our guide Messieurs Martins and Auguste de St. Hilaire, who have written with much exactness on the vegetable wonders displayed in the Brazilian forests. Their aspect varies according to the nature of the soil, and the distribution of water traversing them. If these forests are not the seat of a constant supply of moisture, or if the moisture is only renewed by periodical rains, the drought stops the vegetation, and it becomes intermittent, ‘as in European climates. This is the case in the Catingas. The vegetation of the untrodden forests, on the contrary, of which Auguste de St: Hilaire gives an eloquent picture, is the reverse of this; excited by the ceaseless action of the two agents, humidity and heat, the vegetation of the virgin forests remains in a state of continual activity. The winter is only distinguished from the summer by a shade of colour in the verdure of the foliage; and if some of the trees lose their leaves, it is to assume immediately a new appearance. Now let us listen to the French botanist. Auguste de St. Hilaire says, “ When an European arrives in America, and sees from a distance the un-

trodden forests for the first time, he is no longer astonished at all the singular forms which he admired in European hothouses; here they are mingled in masses and lost. But he is astonished to find in the outline of the forests so little difference between those of his own country and those of the New World. If anything strikes him, it is only the grandeur of the proportions and the deep green colour of the leaves, which, under the most

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