Not
a breath of air has rustled a leaf, not even a falling fruit has
broken the spell of silence; the undying verdure, the freshness
of each tree, even in its mysterious age, create an idea of
eternal vegetation, and the silvery yet dim light adds to the
charm of the fairylike solitude which gradually steals over the
senses.
I have ridden for fifteen or twenty miles through one of these
forests without hearing a sound, except that of my horse's hoof
occasionally striking against a root. Neither beast nor bird is
to be seen except upon the verge. The former has no food upon
such barren ground; and the latter can find no berries, as the
earth is sunless and free from vegetation. Not even monkeys are
to be seen, although the trees must produce fruit and seed.
Everything appears to have deserted the country, and to have
yielded it as the sole territory of Nature on a stupendous scale.
The creepers lie serpent-like along the ground to the thickness
of a man's waist, and, rearing their twisted forms on high, they
climb the loftiest trees, hanging in festoons from stern to stem
like the cables of a line-of-battle-ship, and extending from tree
to tree for many hundred yards; now felling to the earth and
striking a fresh root; then, with increased energy, remounting
the largest trunks, and forming a labyrinth of twisted ropes
along the ceiling of the forest.
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