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#12 A maritime forest
of viviparous trees, near Ubatuva
in the province of Sao Paulo
Latin translation
by Ben Hennelly
When I was explaining etching #11, I had occasion
to discuss the vegetation that forms the lowermost ring along the surface
of the river. The vegetation which I am now preparing to discuss in
detail holds the same position relative to the edge of the ocean itself;
thus, you could say that, after the Thalassophytes proper, it occupies the bottommost station of Brazil.
And yet, this remarkable
form of plant life has a place not only in Brazil, but is spread
throughout almost all the shorelines within the bounds of the tropics,
and in such a way that it presents the same appearance everywhere, though
it does not consist of the same species everywhere. In that lowermost
vegetation which lies along the Amazon
River, and likewise along all the other major rivers of Brazil,
we find a considerable diversity of plants, grasses, shrubs, bushes
and trees.
Conocarpus erecta
The vegetation we are treating now comprises only a few species: Rhizophora Mangle (1), Avicennia nitida and Avicennia tomentosa,Conocarpus erecta, Laguncularia
racemosaand Bucida
Buceras. They are not found in the earth, but put down roots
in that thin mud -- white and not unlike smooth pottage -- which is cast onto low-lying shores by the ocean's waves and, because
of the large mass of decaying organisms it carries with it, emits unpleasant
odors. And so, rooted in this mud, they cover the ground with a dense
belt of foliage that remains full and green through all the seasons
of the year. Where no place is allowed for such a layer of muck on sandy
shores covered with rocks and stones, this form of vegetation does not
appear. For this reason, whoever approaches by ship can, from the presence
of the vegetation, more or less form a conjecture as to the nature and
character of the shores covered by it.
Whenever we catch sight, from a distance, of these maritime forests,
which we might call Manglares or Manguesaes in the languages of the Spaniards and the
Portuguese, they all generally match one another in that we find trees
fifteen to forty-five feet tall, which seem to rise from the very waves
of the ocean, and which so crowd and interconnect their branches and
shoots -- densely covered with shiny, leathery leaves -- that you cannot
find space a foot wide where the foliage is interrupted enough so that
the ground of the shore lies visible behind it. Where the ground stretches
into a deep plain, the forested belt of this kind altogether cuts off
a farther view, and the European approaching tropical shores, for perhaps
the first time, will observe nothing except the extreme licentiousness
and the fullness of the greenery, but not at all that variety and loveliness
of forms usually expected. In those places where the simple vegetation
of the mangrove woods predominates, palms are not found, nor other magnificent
plant forms (2).
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