{79a} There are hundreds of them in the mountains round: but most of them dead, from the intense drought and fires of last year.

Beyond it, again, is a round-headed tree, looking like a huge Portugal laurel, covered with racemes of purple buds.

That is an 'Angelim'; {79b} when full-grown, one of the finest timbers in the world.

And what are those at the top of the brow, rising out of the rich green scrub?
Verily, again, we are in the Tropics.

They are palms, doubtless, some thirty feet high each, with here and there a young one springing up like a gigantic crown of male-fern.