Indeed, Gigantic Grasses, Climbers, Shrubs And Trees,
With But Few Plants, Constitute The Vegetation Of This Region.
NOVEMBER 20TH.
An eclipse of the sun, which I had anxiously
hoped to observe with a view of determining the longitude,
happened this morning, and, as often took place in this cloudy climate,
the sun was covered four minutes before it began. When it shone forth
the eclipse was in progress, and a few minutes before it should
(according to my calculations) have ended the sun was again
completely obscured. The greatest patience and perseverance are required,
if one wishes to ascertain his position when it is the rainy season.
Before leaving, I had an opportunity of observing a curious insect,
which inhabits trees of the fig family (`Ficus'), upward of twenty species
of which are found here. Seven or eight of them cluster round a spot
on one of the smaller branches, and there keep up a constant distillation
of a clear fluid, which, dropping to the ground, forms a little puddle below.
If a vessel is placed under them in the evening, it contains
three or four pints of fluid in the morning. The natives say that,
if a drop falls into the eyes, it causes inflammation of these organs.
To the question whence is this fluid derived, the people reply
that the insects suck it out of the tree, and our own naturalists
give the same answer. I have never seen an orifice,
and it is scarcely possible that the tree can yield so much.
A similar but much smaller homopterous insect, of the family `Cercopidae',
is known in England as the frog-hopper (`Aphrophora spumaria'),
when full grown and furnished with wings, but while still in the pupa state
it is called "Cuckoo-spit", from the mass of froth in which
it envelops itself.
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