Surrounded by lofty airy cassias, broad-leaved, white-stemmed cecropias, thick-crowned myrtles, large-flowered bignonias, climbing tufts of the mellifluous paullinias, far-spreading tendrils of the passion-flower, and of the richly flowering hatched coronilla, above which rise the waving summits of Macaubu palms, we fancied ourselves transported into the gardens of the Hesperides.