under the most brilliant sky imaginable, impart a grave and severe aspect to the landscape. In order to appreciate all the beauties of the tropical forest we must plunge into retreats as old as the world. Nothing there reminds us of the fatiguing monotony of our oak and fir forests: each tree has a bearing peculiar to itself. Each has its own foliage, and often its own peculiar shade of verdure. Gigantic specimens of vegetation, each belonging to different, sometimes to remote, families, mingle their branches and blend their foliage. Five-leaved _Bignoniaceæ_ grow beside _Cæsalpinia_, and the golden leaves of _Cassia_ spread themselves in falling upon arborescent ferns. Myrtles and _Eugenia_, with their thousand-times-divided branches, are finely contrasted with the elegant simplicity of the palms; _Cecropia_ spreads its broad leaves and branches, which resemble immense candelabra, among the delicate foliage of _Mimosa_. There are trees with perfectly smooth bark, others are defended by prickly spines; and the enormous trunk of a species of wild fig spreads itself out with sloping plates, which seem to support it like so many arched buttresses. The obscure flowers of our beeches and oaks only attract the attention of naturalists; but in the forests of South America gigantic trees often display the most brilliant colors in their corolla. Long golden clusters hang from the branches of the _Cassia_. _Vochysia_ erect a thyrsus of odd-shaped flowers. Yellow and sometimes purple corollas, longer than those of our _Digitalis_, cover in profusion the species of trumpet-flowered _Bignonia_; and _Chorisia_ is decked with flowers which resemble our lily in shape, and remind us of _Alstromeria_ from the mixture of colors they present. Certain vegetable forms, which assume at home very humble proportions, present themselves with a floral pomp unknown in temperate climates; some _Boraginaceæ_ become shrubs; many _Euphorbiaceæ_ assume the proportions of majestic trees, offering an agreeable shelter under their thick umbrageous foliage.”