"Beyond the belt of swamps which extends along the coast, where ill-nourished trees, overladen with parasites, struggle against imperfect drainage and poverty of soil, at the very foot of the _serra_, the true forest begins. The dome-like summits of the great trees, ranged in ascending ranks upon the slope, completely screen the soil they spring from, thus giving the peculiar illusion that this wonderful vegetation rises, from a common level, to the extreme height of the range. Here and there only emerges from the foliage the smooth water-worn side of a granite bluff. The railway track runs between walls of verdure; the underwoods, which elsewhere suffer from the lack of light, grow eagerly along the sides of the trench-like clearing. Lianas, ferns, bamboos, grow vigorously as high as the tree-tops. One seems actually to see the brutal struggle of the plants toward the sunlight and the air. Many travellers have spoken of the sense of conflict and of violence produced by the virgin forest. There is, indeed, along the clearings cut by man, and over the trees which he fells but does not remove, a fierce battle between species and species, individual and individual; a desperate struggle for space and air. As always, it is man who introduces disorder into the heart of Nature. Far from his track order reigns, established by the victory of the strongest; and the forest which has never been violated gives a profound impression of peace and calm. "The _serra_ is the true home of the equatorial forest. But it covers beyond the ridge the southern and western portions of the State of Minas and the basins of the Rio Doce and the Parahyba. The Martiqueira very nearly marks the limit of the forests; beyond commences a dense growth of bush. I remember a long journey along the northern slope of the range upon which is built the new capital of the State of Minas, the city of Bello Horizonte. Towards the north we could see vast stretches of uncovered land; the mountains were partly clothed with narrow belts of forest, which climbed upward through the valleys to the very sources of the streams; we passed alternately through thickets of thorn and prairies where the soil was studded with the nests of termites. The dense trees, deprived of their leaves by months of drought, were beginning to revive, and were decking themselves with flowers, of a startling wealth of colour unknown to the forests of the humid regions. There it was that the bush commenced. It stretched unbroken to the north--unbroken save for the streams, which were full or empty according to the rain they had received.