All The World Knows, For Instance, That This Zone Is Embellished By The Contrasts Exhibited In The Foliage Of The Trees, And Particularly By The Great Number Of Those With Pinnate Leaves.

The ash, the service-tree, the inga, the acacia of the United States, the gleditsia, the tamarind, the mimosa,

The desmanthus, have all pinnate leaves, with foliolae more or less long, slender, tough, and shining. But can a group of ash-trees, of service-trees, or of sumach, recall the picturesque effect of tamarinds or mimosas, when the azure of the sky appears through their small, slender, and delicately pinnated leaves? These considerations are more important than they may at first seem. The forms of plants determine the physiognomy of nature; and this physiognomy influences the moral dispositions of nations. Every type comprehends species, which, while exhibiting the same general appearance, differ in the varied development of the similar organs. The palm-trees, the scitamineae, the malvaceae, the trees with pinnate leaves, do not all display the same picturesque beauties; and generally the most beautiful species of each type, in plants as in animals, belong to the equinoctial zone.

The proteaceae,* (* Rhopalas, which characterise the vegetation of the Llanos.) crotons, agaves, and the great tribe of the cactuses, which inhabit exclusively the New World, disappear gradually, as we ascend the Orinoco above the Apure and the Meta. It is, however, the shade and humidity, rather than the distance from the coast, which oppose the migration of the cactuses southward.

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