Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 2 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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All These Trees (With
The Exception Of Our New Genus Retiniphyllum) Were More Than One
Hundred Or One Hundred And Ten Feet High.
As their trunks throw out
branches only toward the summit, we had some trouble in procuring both
leaves and flowers.
The latter were frequently strewed upon the ground
at the foot of the trees; but, the plants of different families being
grouped together in these forests, and every tree being covered with
lianas, we could not, with any degree of confidence, rely on the
authority of the natives, when they assured us that a flower belonged
to such or such a tree. Amid these riches of nature heborizations
caused us more chagrin than satisfaction. What we could gather
appeared to us of little interest, compared to what we could not
reach. It rained unceasingly during several months, and M. Bonpland
lost the greater part of the specimens which he had been compelled to
dry by artificial heat. Our Indians distinguished the leaves better
than the corollae or the fruit. Occupied in seeking timber for canoes,
they are inattentive to flowers. "All those great trees bear neither
flowers nor fruits," they repeated unceasingly. Like the botanists of
antiquity, they denied what they had not taken the trouble to observe.
They were tired with our questions, and exhausted our patience in
return.
We have already mentioned that the same chemical properties being
sometimes found in the same organs of different families of plants,
these families supply each other's places in various climates.
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