This was owing to a great portion of the island being slightly above the mean level, but still covered by the high flood waters.

On each side were massed forests of giant trees, whose summits towered some fifty feet above the ground, and joining one bank to the other formed an immense cradle.
On the left nothing could be more picturesque than this flooded forest, which seemed to have been planted in the middle of a lake.

The stems of the trees arose from the clear, still water, in which every interlacement of their boughs was reflected with unequaled purity.

They were arranged on an immense sheet of glass, like the trees in miniature on some table _epergne,_ and their reflection could not be more perfect.
The difference between the image and the reality could scarcely be described.

Duplicates of grandeur, terminated above and below by a vast parasol of green, they seemed to form two hemispheres, inside which the jangada appeared to follow one of the great circles.
It had been necessary to bring the raft under these boughs, against which flowed the gentle current of the stream.