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#33 Prospect
from the ridge of Serra
d'Estrella into the bay of Sebastianopolis, Guanabara Bay, in the city of Rio de
Janeiro.
Latin translation by
Ben Hennelly
I should doubt that any place in all the lands might be found which
moves the lover of nature with a happier stirring than the ridge which
foreigners have given the name Serra
d'Estrella, in memory of the name of the mountain tract among
the Portuguese. Even today, though my hairs are already greying (1),
I grow young again, as it were, when I recall the pleasant memory of
the time when, setting out from the estate of my dear friend George
von Langsdorff, Fazenda
Mandiocca, I climbed up from the fertile valley through the
steep mountain defiles, in order to see the examples of delightfulness
which nature gives to be seen near at hand, the beauty of the prospect
over the boundless expanse of the regions. The path leads now through
the shadows of densely woven forest, now through open
Road through Serra d' Estrella toward Minas Gerais
fields to the
ridge of the mountain where the easiest entrance into the province of Minas is frequently
traveled. A great fullness of things presents itself to the botanist
here. Let us ascend together, dear reader, from the bottom of the valley
up to the very summit of the mountain. Let those things which we shall
presently try to depict be in the manner in which a botanical investigator
conveys to another what he himself perceives and feels, instead of a
purely scientific description.
A very green meadow covers the mountain's roots, and not, as it seems,
a meadow born from forest that has been chopped down in the usual way,  but rather a primary meadow. Here and there fairly robust trees rise
up from the meadow, such as Jequetiba, Couratori legalis, Paineira, Chorisia precious St. Hilary, Tecoma flavescens M.,
which is along with others of the same genera called Ipe by
the Brazilians. Different kinds of hedges -- composed of Gouania, Combretum gracile, Doliocarpus
sessiliflorus and Davilla
rugosa, then of Bougainvillea
spectabilis, some species of Comesperma, Croton, Solanum, Cordia, Seriana
cuspidata and Seriana
communis St. Hilary, and some Paulliniae that give off the most pleasant smells from their flowers, Schmidelia, Echites atroviolacea M., Bignonia venusta (called Bellas by the inhabitants because of the fiery beauty of their
flowers), Vanillosmae, Mikaniae, Vernoniae,
and species of Eupatorium -- are scattered through the field, noteworthy for the peculiarity of
the form with which they rise up with their "versatile leaves" (2) among those scattered trees,
here and there letting their full foliage hang down to the ground.
From these open fields you at last will reach the mountains' roots,
which  are composed of granite and foliaceous granite, and which here
leap straight up in an steep mass, and there are broken up into rock
fragments which block one's path, and through which the clearest of
springs wander. Under the shadows of these rocks are cushions of mosses,
clumps of Cladoniae noteworthy for their crimson apothecia and of various ferns, Begoniae with peculiarly shaped leaves, Dorsteniae, Cacteae and Bromeliaceae that delight with the spectacular colors of their flowers (which compare
to the variety of Orchids), from among which I will mention Sophronitis
grandiflora, which reaches up to the highest peaks, and Cattleya
labiata.
 
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