I soon guessed (and rightly) that I was looking at that Palma de Jagua, {246} which excited--and no wonder--the enthusiasm of the usually unimpassioned Humboldt.

Magnificent as the tree is when its radiating leaves are viewed from above, it is even more magnificent when you stand beneath it.

The stem, like that of the Coconut, usually curves the height of a man ere it rises in a shaft for fifty or sixty feet more.

From the summit of that shaft springs a crown--I had rather say, a fountain-- of pinnated leaves; only eight or ten of them; but five-and-twenty feet long each.

For three-fourths of their length they rise at an angle of 45 degrees or more; for the last fourth they fall over, till the point hangs straight down; and each leaflet, which is about two feet and a half long, falls over in a similar curve, completing the likeness of the whole to a fountain of water, or a gush of rockets.