spiders!"--in a chapter on beauty; but prejudice must not make us shut
our eyes to glories even among these. In the tropical species there is
often metallic splendour and brilliance of colour. In my "Naturalist's
Sojourn in Jamaica," my friend Mr Hill has written some very interesting
observations on the web of a certain Spider, and on the relations of its
structure with that of the Spider itself; but I allude to it now because
of the elegance of the creature, the _Epeira argentata_ of Fabricius.
The upper surface of the body is of a glistening satiny or silvery
whiteness, the belly yellow, spotted with black, and the legs marked
with alternate rings of the same contrasted hues.
In the same island I was familiar with another species, (_Nephila
clavipes_,) remarkable for the length and strength of its silken cords.
The body, which is lengthened, is studded with round white spots, each
encircled with a black border, on a rich greenish brown ground,
reminding one of the characteristic markings of the Tragopans among
birds. The cephalothorax is shining black, its lustre half concealed by
a clothing of short silvery down: the legs are very long, and have a
remarkably elegant appearance from having a bunch of black hair set
around the extremity of the first and second joints, like the bristles
of a bottle-brush.
I fortify my own verdict with the observations of a brother naturalist
on the Spiders of Borneo, presuming that those which he alludes to
appear to belong to the genus _Gastracantha_, of which I have seen
species in Jamaica.
"The spiders, so disgusting in appearance in many other countries, are
here of quite a different nature, and are the most beautiful of the
insect tribe; they have a skin of a shell-like texture, furnished with
curious processes, in some long, in others short, in some few, in others
numerous; but are found, of this description, only in thick woods and
shaded places: their colours are of every hue, brilliant and metallic as
the feathers of the humming-bird, but are, unlike the bright colours of
the beetle, totally dependent on the life of the insect which they
beautify, so that it is impossible to preserve them."[215]
It is possible that this beauty might be less evanescent if the animals
were preserved in spirit or other antiseptic fluid. A writer in the
_Zoologist_ (p. 5929) mentions the fact that the iridescence of certain
beetles (_Cassida_) which is peculiarly splendid and metallic, and which
disappears immediately on the insects' becoming dry, is perpetuated in
its original loveliness when the specimens are preserved in spirit, even
after the lapse of several years.
The tropical species of this genus are far finer and richer than our
little English kinds, though these are pretty. I was much delighted by
the brilliance of some of the Jamaican species, and Sir Emerson Tennent
thus speaks of them in Ceylon:--
"There is one family of insects, the members of which cannot fail to
strike the traveller by their singular beauty, the _Cassidadae_, or
tortoise beetles, in which the outer shell overlaps the body, and the
limbs are susceptible of being drawn entirely within it. The rim is
frequently of a different tint from the centre, and one species which I
have seen is quite startling from the brilliancy of its colouring, which
gives it the appearance of a ruby inclosed in a frame of pearl; but this
wonderful effect disappears immediately on the death of the
insect."[216]
If we turn to the vegetable world, what a profusion of beauty do we
find! Exquisite are the tiny Mosses, when the fogs and rains of winter,
so inimical to other vegetation, have quickened them into verdure and
fruit. How they spread along the hedgerow banks in soft fleeces of vivid
emerald, and shoot up their slender stalks, each crowned with its tiny
urn, and wearing its fairy nightcap! Beautiful are the tiny dark-green
feather-like leaves of the Forkmoss crowded on the clayey bank;
beautiful the wild sprays of the plumy Hypnum; and beautiful the little
round velvet cushions of Tortula, that grow on every old wall-top.
"The tiny moss, whose silken verdure clothes
The time-worn rock, and whose bright capsules rise,
Like fairy urns, on stalks of golden sheen,
Demand our admiration and our praise,
As much as cedar kissing the blue sky
Or Krubul's giant-flower. God made them all,
And what _He_ deigns to make should ne'er be deem'd
Unworthy of our study."
Exquisite too are the Ferns, in their arching fronds, so richly cut in
elegant tracery. See a fine crown of the Lady Fern in a shaded
Devonshire lane, and confess that grace and beauty are triumphant there.
And in the saturated atmosphere of the tropical islands, where these
lovely plants form a very large proportion of the entire vegetation, and
some of them rise on slender stems thirty or forty feet in altitude,
from the summit of which the wide-spreading fronds arch gracefully on
every side, like a vast umbrella of twinkling verdure, through whose
filagree work the sunbeams are sparkling,--what can be more charming
than Ferns?
The queenly Palms, too, are models of stately beauty. Linnaeus called
them _vegetabilium principes_; and, when we see them in some noble
conservatory of adequate dimensions, such as the glass palm-house at
Kew, crowded side by side, with their crowned heads, and lofty stature,
and proud, erect bearing, we are involuntarily reminded of the monarchs
of many kingdoms met in august conclave.
"Lo! higher still the stately palm-trees rise,
Chequering the clouds with their unbending stems,
And o'er the clouds, amid the dark-blue skies,
Lifting their rich unfading diadems.
How calm and placidly they rest
Upon the heaven's indulgent breast,
As if their branches never breeze had known!
Light bathes them aye in glancing showers,
And Silence, 'mid their lofty bowers,
Sits on her moveless throne."
Are the Grasses worthy of mention for their beauty? Surely, yes. Many of
them display a downy lightness exquisitely lovely, as the common
Feather-grass. The golden panicles of the great Quake-grass, so
curiously compacted and hanging in stalks of so hair-like a tenuity as
to nod and tremble with the slightest motion, how beautiful are these!
And the satiny plumes of the Pampas-grass projecting from the clump of
leaves form a fine object. But the Bamboos, those great arborescent
Grasses of the tropics, form a characteristic feature of the vegetation
of those regions, of almost unexampled magnificence. I have seen them in
their glory, and can sympathise with the philosophical Humboldt in the
powerful effect which the grandeur of the Bamboo produces on the poetic
mind. It is an object never to be forgotten, especially when growing in
those isolated clumps, that look like tufts of ostrich-plumes magnified
to colossal dimensions. A thousand of these noble reeds standing in
close array, each four or five inches in the diameter of its stem, and
rising in erect dignity to the height of forty feet, and all waving
their tufted summits in diverging curves moved by every breeze,--form,
indeed, a magnificent spectacle. Growing in the most rocky situations,
the Bamboo is frequently planted in Jamaica on the very apex of those
conical hills which form so remarkable a feature in the landscape of the
interior, and to which its noble tufts constitute a most becoming crown.
Mr Ellis thus describes the elegance of these magnificent Grasses in
Madagascar:--
"The base of the hills and the valleys were covered with the Bamboo,
which was far more abundant than during any former part of the journey.
There were at least four distinct varieties: one a large growing kind,
erect nearly to the point; a second smaller, seldom rising much above
twenty feet in height, bushy at the base, and gracefully bending down
its tapering point. A third kind rose in single cane, almost without a
leaf, to the height of thirty feet or more; or, bending over, formed a
perfectly circular arch. I also saw a Bamboo growing as a creeper, with
small short joints, feathered with slender leafy branches at every
joint, and stretching in festoons from tree to tree along the side of
the road, or hanging suspended in single lines from a projecting branch,
and swinging gently with the passing breeze. The appearance of the
Bamboo when growing is exceedingly graceful. Sometimes the canes, as
thick as a man's arm at the base, rise forty or fifty feet high, fringed
at the joints, which are two or three feet apart, with short branches of
long, lance-shaped leaves. The smaller kinds, which abound most in this
region, are still more elegant; and the waving of the canes, with their
attenuated but feathery-looking points, bending down like a plume, and
the tremulous quivering, even in the slightest breeze, of their long,
slender leaves, present ever-varying aspects of beauty; and, combined
with the bright-green colour of the Bamboo-cane and leaf, impart an
indescribable charm to the entire landscape."[217]
Glorious in loveliness are the _Musaceae_, the Plantains and Bananas of
the hot regions. Humboldt calls the Banana "one of the noblest and most
lovely of vegetable productions;" and truly its enormous, flag-like
leaves of the richest green, permeated by nervures running transversely
in exactly parallel lines, and arching out in every direction from the
succulent, spongy, sheathed stem, command our admiration, apart from the
beauty of their flowers, or the importance of their fruit.
In a description of a mountain scene in Tahiti, drawn with graphic power
by Charles Darwin, the Banana forms a prominent element:--"I could not
look on the surrounding plants without admiration. On every side were
forests of Banana; the fruit of which, though serving for food in
various ways, lay in heaps decaying on the ground.... As the evening
drew to a close, I strolled beneath the gloomy shade of the Bananas up
the course of the stream. My walk was soon brought to a close, by coming
to a waterfall between two and three hundred feet high; and again above
this there was another.... In the little recess where the water fell, it
did not appear that a breath of wind had ever blown. The thin edges of
the great leaves of the Banana, damp with spray, were unbroken, instead
of being, as is so generally the case, split into a thousand shreds.
From our position, almost suspended on the mountain-side, there were
glimpses into the depths of the neighbouring valleys: and the lofty
points of the central mountains, towering up within sixty degrees of the
zenith, hid half the evening sky. Thus seated, it was a sublime
spectacle to watch the shades of night gradually obscuring the last and
highest pinnacles."[218]
This scene must have been one of surpassing sublimity and loveliness.
Few doubtless have ever beheld anything that can be compared with it.
But perhaps many have felt--I have, often,--that there are occasions in
which the sense of the beautiful in nature becomes almost painfully
overpowering. I have gazed on some very lovely prospects, bathed perhaps
in the last rays of the evening sun, till my soul seemed to struggle
with a very peculiar undefinable sensation, as if longing for a power to
enjoy, which I was conscious I did not possess, and which found relief
only in tears. I have felt conscious that there were elements of
enjoyment and admiration there, which went far beyond my capacity of
enjoying and admiring; and I have delighted to believe, that, by and by,
when, in the millennial kingdom of Jesus, and, still more, in the
remoter future, in the dispensation of the fulness of times, the
earth--the "_new_ earth,"--shall be endowed with a more than
paradisaical glory, there will be given to redeemed man a greatly
increased power and capacity for drinking in, and enjoying the augmented
loveliness. Doubtless the risen and glorified saints, sitting with the
King of kings upon His throne, will have the senses of their spiritual
bodies expanded in capacity beyond what we can now form the slightest
conception of; and as all then will be enjoyment of the most exquisite
kind, and absolutely unalloyed by interruption or satiety,--the eye will
at length be satisfied with seeing, and the ear be satisfied with
hearing. "_I shall be satisfied_, when I awake up with thy likeness."
It is in _Flowers_ that the beauty of the vegetable world chiefly
resides; and I shall now therefore select a few examples from the
profusion of lovely objects which the domain proper of Flora presents to
us.
That very curious tribe of plants, the _Orchideae_, so remarkable for the
mimic forms of other things, that its blossoms delight to assume, is
also pre-eminent in gorgeous beauty. Take the _Sobraliae_,--terrestrial
species from Central America, where they form extensive thickets,
growing thrice the height of man, with slender nodding stems, and
alternate willow-like leaves, and terminal racemes loaded with
snow-white, pink, crimson, or violet flowers.[219] Imagine the crushing
through "thickets" of the lovely _S. macrantha_! The large lily-like
blossoms of this species are eight inches long, and as many wide, of the
richest purple crimson, and of the most elegant shape conceivable, with
the lip so wrapped round the column as to appear funnel-shaped, bordered
by an exquisitely-cut fringe.
I have before alluded to _Phajus Tankervilliae_, that rich lily-like
spike of blossom which I stumbled on in the midst of a dense thicket in
the mountains of Jamaica. Another terrestrial genus of great elegance is
_Cypripedium_, of which we have one native species, _C. calceolus_, the
yellow lady's slipper,--one of the most charming, but the rarest and
most difficult of propagation, of British plants. But this is far
excelled in beauty by many of the exotic species; as, for example, the
exquisite _C. barbatum_ from Malacca. The very foliage is princely; for
the nervures and cross-veins form a network pattern of dark green upon
the light green area of each broad leaf. The blossom rears up its noble
head erect, with its standard-petal of white, striped with green and
purple, the wing-petals studded with purple tubercles along their edges,
and the lip or slipper-shaped petal of a dark purple hue.
My readers may have occasionally noticed a little plant, in the most
recherchees stove-houses, of so much delicacy and preciousness that it
is invariably kept under a bell-glass. I mean the _Anaectochilus
setaceus_. It belongs to this tribe, and is a terrestrial species,
growing about the roots of the trees in the humid forests of Ceylon. Its
exquisite loveliness has attracted the attention of even the apathetic
Cingalese, who call it by the poetical epithet of _Wanna Raja_, or king
of the forest. It does not appear to possess any peculiar attractiveness
in its blossoms,--indeed, I have never seen it in flower; but its
leaves, which grow in opposite pairs, are elegantly heart-shaped, of a
deep rich greenish-brown hue, approaching to black, of a surface which
resembles velvet, reticulated all over with pale golden veins, which,
being numerous and minute, have a very charming appearance, somewhat
like the pale network on black patches which we see in the wings of some
dragon-flies.
The epiphyte Orchids are also magnificent in beauty. One of the
handsomest genera is _Dendrobium_, containing many species, mostly
natives of Southern Asia and the great islands. Perhaps the finest of
all is _D. nobile_, of which the sepals and petals are greenish-white,
tipped with rich purple, and the downy tube-like lip is of the same
regal hue in the interior, with a pale yellow margin.
By the side of this you may set the lovely _Huntleya violacea_, one of
the discoveries of Sir R. Schomburgk in the interior of Guiana. Its
broad wavy petals of the softest richest violet, "vary in intensity from
deepest sapphire to the mild iridescence of opal." This fine flower has
a melancholy interest from its being associated with the death of Sir
Robert's friend and fellow-servant, Mr Reiss. The gorgeous scenes of
tropical vegetation in which the plant was found, and the sad accident,
are thus depicted by the accomplished traveller:--
"I discovered the _Huntleya violacea_ for the first time in October
1837, then on my ascent of the river Essequibo. The large cataract,
Cumaka Toto, or Silk Cotton Fall, obliged us to unload our corials, and
to transport the luggage overland, in order to avoid the dangers which a
mass of water, at once so powerful and rapid, and bounded by numerous
rocks, might offer to our ascent. While the Indians were thus occupied,
I rambled about one of the small islands, which the diverging arms of
the river formed in their descent, and the vegetation of which had that
peculiar lively appearance which is so characteristic of the vicinity of
cataracts, where a humid cloud, the effects of the spray, always hovers
around them. Blocks of syenite were heaped together; and while their
black shining surface contrasted strongly with the whitish foam of the
torrent, and with the curly waves beating against the rocky barriers--as
if angry at the boundary which they attempted to set to the incensed
element--their dome-shaped summits were adorned with a vegetation at
once rich and interesting. _Heliconias_, _Tillandsias_, _Bromelias_,
_Ferns_, _Pothos_, _Cyrtopodiums_, _Epidendrums_, _Peperomias_, all
appeared to struggle for the place which so small a surface afforded to
them. The lofty mountains, Akaywanna, Comute, or Taquia, and Tuasinki,
recede and form an amphitheatre, affording a highly interesting scene,
and no doubt the most picturesque of that part of the river Essequibo.
"I was attracted by a number of _Oncidium altissimum_ which covered one
of the rocky piles, and astonished me by their long stems and bright
colour of their flowers, when my attention was more powerfully attracted
by a plant, the appearance of which, although different from the
pseudo-bulbous tribe, proclaimed, nevertheless, that it belonged to that
interesting family, the _Orchideae_. The specimens were numerous; and
clothed almost, with their vivid green, the rugged and dark trunks of
the gigantic trees, which contributed to the majestic scene around me.
It was not long before I discovered one of these plants in flower. It
was as singular as it was new to me;--the sepals and petals of a rich
purple and velvet-like appearance; the helmet, to which form the column
bore the nearest resemblance, of the same colour; the labellum striated
with yellow.
"In the sequel of my expeditions, I found it generally in the vicinity
of cataracts, where a humid vapour is constantly suspended, and where
the rays of the sun are scarcely admitted through a thick canopy of
foliage. I traced the _Huntleya_ from the sixth parallel of latitude to
the shady mountains of the Acaria chain near the equator; but in its
fullest splendour it appeared at one of the small islands among the
Christmas cataracts in the river Berbice. There is a melancholy
circumstance connected with the plant, which its appearance never fails
to recall to my memory. Their singular beauty at this spot induced my
friend, Mr Reiss, who accompanied me as a volunteer during the
unfortunate expedition up the river Berbice, to draw and paint it on the
spot. He was yet occupied with this task when the last of our canoes was
to descend the dangerous cataract. He arose from his occupation,
desirous to descend with the Indians in the canoe, although against my
wish, but he persisted. The canoe approached the fall; it upset; and, of
thirteen persons who were in it at the time, he was the only one who
paid the rash attempt with his life. He is now buried opposite that
island, the richest vegetable productions of which it was his last
occupation to imitate on paper and in colours."[220]
We might linger long on these flowers of strange loveliness, but space
compels us to forsake them and to turn to some other examples in the
wide range of Flora's domains. How glorious a sight must be the sheeted
Rhododendrons of the Himalaya peaks, on whose lofty elevations Dr Hooker
found these fine plants in great prominence, "clothing the
mountain-slopes with a deep-green mantle, glowing with bells of
brilliant colours; of the eight or ten species growing here, [on the
Zemir, in Sikkim, twelve thousand feet above the sea,] every bush was
loaded with as great a profusion of blossoms as are their northern
congeners in our English gardens!"[221]
The noblest of the genus is that which is dedicated to Lady Dalhousie.
It is an epiphyte, being always found growing, like the Orchids, among
mosses and ferns, upon the trunks of large trees, especially oaks and
magnolias, at an elevation of from seven to ten thousand feet. In this
particular, in the fragrance of its noble white blossoms, in its slender
habit, in the whorled arrangement of its branches, and in the length of
time during which it continues in flower in its native regions, viz.,
from April to July, it differs from all its fellows of the same genus
that inhabit northern India.
The flowers are four inches in length and four in diameter, with a broad
trumpet lip. Their colour is pure white, assuming a delicate rosy tinge
as they become old, and sometimes becoming spotted with orange. They
have an odour which resembles that of the lemon.
Of this and the following species Dr Hooker writes from Dorjiling, seven
thousand feet above the sea:--"On the branches of the immense
purple-flowered magnolia, (_M. Campbellii_,) and those of oaks and
laurels, _Rhododendron Dalhousiae_ grows epiphytally, a slender shrub
bearing from three to six white lemon-scented bells, four and a half
inches long and so many broad, at the end of each branch. In the same
woods the scarlet Rhododendron (_R. arboreum_) is very scarce, and is
outvied by the great _R. argenteum_, which grows as a tree, forty feet
high, with magnificent leaves twelve to fifteen inches long, deep green
wrinkled above and silvery below, while the flowers are as large as
those of _R. Dalhousiae_ and grow more in a cluster. I know nothing of
the kind that exceeds in beauty the flowering branch of _R. argenteum_,
with its wide-spreading foliage and glorious mass of flowers."[222]
The latter, which is nearly equal to _R. Dalhousiae_ in the size of its
blossoms, and perhaps superior to it in other respects, is another
white-flowered species. It is, as described above, a tree with large
massive leaves of a silvery tint beneath. When young, they are
exquisitely beautiful, being encased in long flesh-coloured cones of
large scales, of very ornamental appearance. The flowers are three
inches long, forming a compact globose head.
They secrete a large quantity of honey, which is said to be poisonous,
as is also that of _R. Dalhousiae_.
The grandeur and beauty of the same genus are celebrated by Mr Low, as
he saw the species growing in Borneo, where too their parasitic
character struck him, as it had done Dr Hooker:--
"Perhaps the most gorgeous of the native plants are the various species
of the genus _Rhododendron_, which here assume a peculiar form, being
found epiphytal upon the trunks of trees, as the genera of the tribe
_Orchidace{oe}_. This habit, induced probably by the excessive moisture of
the climate, is not, however, confined to the Ericaceous plants, but
also prevails with the genera _Fagria_, _Combretum_, and many others,
usually terrestrial; the roots of the Rhododendrons, instead of being,
as with the species [which are] inhabitants of cold climates, small and
fibrous, become large and fleshy, winding round the trunks of the forest
trees; the most beautiful one is that which I have named in compliment
to Mr Brooke. Its large heads of flowers are produced in the greatest
abundance throughout the year: they much exceed in size those of any
known species, frequently being formed of eighteen flowers, which are of
all shades, from pale and rich yellow to a rich reddish salmon-colour;
in the sun, the flowers sparkle with a brilliancy resembling that of
gold dust.
"Four other species which I discovered are very gorgeous, but of
different colours, one being crimson and another red, and the third a
rich tint between these two: of the fourth I have not yet seen the
flowers."[223]
Take an example from another order. The Lightning-tree of Madagascar
rises before us in the graphic pages of Mr Ellis:--