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278 NOTES OF A BOTANIST CHAP.
Cyclanthacece. - - Three scandent species of Carludovica, all
with bifid leaves.
Pahnacece. Frequent enough, but of few species. The Cadi
or Ivory palm is everywhere dispersed, and is precisely the same
species as I saw at Puma-cocha. I gathered and analysed the
male inflorescence, but the stripping off the fronds for thatch is
unfavourable to the development of the fruit, which I never saw
in a perfect state. A very prickly Bactris, 20 feet high, with five
or six stems from a root, grows here and there ; and in shady
places three or four Geonomse are frequent. The Euterpe grows
chiefly at the upper limit of the Red Bark. A noble Attalea
(called Cumbi and Pal ma real) extends up the valley of San
Antonio to the lower limit of the Bark region. It has a slight
beard to the petiole.
Bromeliacece. Many species are perched about on the trees,
but none of striking aspect. The presence or absence of this
family affords no indication of climate on the equator, for trees
of Buddleia and Polylepis, at the upper limit of arborescent
vegetation, are as thickly hung with a Bromeliacea as any trees
on the Amazon.
Amaryllidea, 2. Both herbaceous twiners, the one a Bomarea,
with pendulous umbels of showy flowers, calyx red, corolla white,
with violet spots ; an order, so far as my experience goes, entirely
absent from equinoctial plains, but tolerably abundant in the
temperate and cool regions of the Andes.
Musacea. Heliconia, two species.
Zingiberacetz. Cossus, three species. This is about the
highest point at which I have seen any Cossus or Heliconia, two
genera frequent in the plains.
Marantacece. Two or three species of Maranta were observed.
Orckidacece, 28. - -Tolerably abundant, but comprising few
handsome species. Most epiphytal Orchids love light, and in
the dense lofty forest they are rarely seen, and often inaccessible,
for they grow on the upper branches of large trees, and descend
to the lower branches only on the margin of wide streams, where
the whole of one side of the trees is exposed to the light. At
Limon, however, in ancient clearings, now become pastures,
where a few trees of the primitive forest have been left, and
where others have here and there sprung up, despite the treading
about of cattle, the branches are laden with Orchids and
Vacciniums and ; although none of the former be of remarkable
beauty, yet they are in so great variety, and there is such a charm
in seeing them on the rugged mossy trees in their native woods,
that to me they were always objects of interest. The finest
Orchid, as to its flowers, is an Odontoglossum, with large
chocolate-coloured flowers, margined with yellow. As respects
foliage, a fairy Stelis (S. calodyction, MSS.), with roundish pale