The most beautiful thing in the tropics is a young palm-tree. The old ones are more graceful than any of our foliage plants, but they all show signs of decay. The young ones, so supple as to bend before the winds, are the ideal of grace and loveliness, as picturesque in repose as they are in motion. The long, spreading leaves, of a vivid green, bend and sway with the breeze, and nod in the sunlight with a beauty which cannot be described. [Illustration: THE RIVER ABOVE GUAYAQUIL.] There is considerable business done in Guayaquil, and some of the merchants carry stocks of imported goods valued at half a million dollars, with an annual trade of double that amount. It is the only town in Ecuador worth speaking of in a commercial point of view, and its tradesmen do the entire wholesale business of that republic. The shipments of cocoa, rubber, hides, coffee, ivory, nuts, and cinchona (quinine) bark amount to about $6,000,000 a year, and the imports, the President of Ecuador told us, amount annually to $10,000,000. There is no way to ascertain the truth of his Excellency’s statements, as the Government keeps no statistics of its commerce, and he admitted that it was only an estimate based upon the amount of duties collected; but one may be allowed to doubt that a country like Ecuador, the most backward, ignorant, and impoverished in all America, can purchase for many years in succession twice as much as it sells. [Illustration: AN AVERAGE DWELLING.] Founded in 1535 by one of the lieutenants of Pizarro, Guayaquil has been the market for five hundred miles of coast ever since, but now it is almost destitute of native capital, nearly all the merchants being foreigners, mostly English and German, with one or two from the United States. It is the only place in Ecuador in which modern civilization exists; the rest of the country is a century behind the times. Since its foundation Guayaquil has been burned several times, and often plundered by pirates; now its commercial condition seems secure from all dangers except revolutions, which are epidemic in Ecuador. In fact, the country would feel queer without one. Earthquakes are frequent, but the elastic bamboo houses only shiver--they never fall. To the torch of the revolutionist, however, they are like tinder, and the blocks that have been burned over testify to its effectiveness as a weapon of destruction. [Illustration: GUAYAQUIL.] Over the entrances to the houses are tin signs, each of which represents the flag of the country of which the dweller within is a citizen; and upon these signs are painted warnings to revolutionary looters or incendiaries--“This is the property of a citizen of Great Britain;” or, “This is the property of a citizen of Germany;” or, “This is the property of a citizen of the United States”--and the robber and torch-bearer are expected to respect them as such, but seldom do.