By the side of a stream which flows through the valley where these plantations are, we noticed a nettle-like tree, with a stem eight inches in diameter, and nearly twenty feet high, which proved to be a new species of _Bæhmeria_ (_B. arborescens_, Gardn.). For a considerable way our ascending path was bordered with bitter orange trees, the shade afforded by which was no less acceptable than their fruit was grateful; for the juice though a little bitter is not disagreeably so. Both here, and in many other parts about Rio, this bitter kind of orange grows apparently wild; it is called the wild orange by the Brazilians (_Laranja da Terra_), but it is certainly not indigenous. Thence, we came to a tract where the original forest having been felled, was replaced by a thick wood of young trees, consisting chiefly of arborescent _Solanums_, _Crotons_, _Vernonias_, &c., while great numbers of _Cecropia peltata_ and _palmata_ reared their heads above the rest, conspicuous at a great distance from their white bark, their large lobed leaves, the snowy under-surface of which, when agitated by the wind, gives the tree the appearance of being covered with large white blossoms. Near the summit of the Pedra Bonita, there is a small Fazenda, or farm, the proprietor of which was then clearing away the forest which covers it, converting the larger trees into charcoal. From the massive trunks of some of them which had just been felled, we obtained some very pretty Orchideous plants, and several of the larger denizens of the forest, found to belong to the natural orders _Melastomaceæ_, _Myrtaceæ_, _Compositæ_, and _Leguminosæ_. The ascent of the Pedra Bonita is made from the north side. Immediately on emerging from the forest, and attaining the summit, a most magnificent view of the surrounding country presented itself. It was then nearly sunset, so we had but little time for botanizing. We only saw enough to convince us that the vegetation of the top of this mountain had a very different character from those of any others we had visited near Rio: resembling more, as I have since ascertained, that of the mountains of the interior. A few days afterwards we made another journey to it, but on this occasion the whole mountain was enveloped in clouds, the minute globules of which they were composed being distinctly visible, as they swept past under the influence of a strong breeze which was blowing from the north. A great part of the top we found to be covered with the beautiful lily-like _Vellozia candida_, on the branches of which grew a pretty _Epidendrum_, with rose-coloured flowers. Along with the _Vellozia_ grew two beautiful subscandent species of _Echites_,[2] one with large dark violet-coloured flowers, the other with white ones of a similar size. They both exhale an odour not unlike that of the common primrose, but more powerful. On the edge of a precipice on the eastern side, we found, covered with its large