bronze yellow colour led me at first to expect it might be magnetic
pyrites, (ftr sulfure ferrifere, H .J but its slight effect on the
needle, and its chrystallized form, corrected the impression. Pyrites
have been cited iir basalt, and there has been no doubt of the fact,
but I believe specimens have not yet reached any cabinet. I
descended again for a short distance, and turning to the north,
pursued my course to the Coural along the edges of the beautiful
ravines, which appear on the left, in going by the more direct road.
A slight, crazy railing occasionally edged the precipices, along
which the narrow path ascends; but more frequently, there was
not even this fancied security to assure the passenger, while he
contemplated the awful depths beneath.
A conglomerate of fragments of porous-and decomposing basalt,
above- the upper or compact basalt, of inconsiderable depth, and
not general, was the only additional deposit to what I had observed
at the water-side. Basaltic dikes, intersecting the tufa, frequently
disclosed:themselves in the sides of the ravines, which were highly
cultivated with the convolvulus batata, and an arum, which I shall
describe presently. The streams which usurp the bed of the torrent
until the rainy season, flowed through thick tufts of water-
cresses ; the honeysuckles twisted round, and hung from one ches-
nut tree to another; thet brambles were bending under the weight
of their berries, and the wild strawberry was pushing forth its
compact foliage from the banks, which were lined with the most
elegant ferns, whilst the sides of almost all the precipices were
covered with vines. Here I found a plant much resembling the
physalis alkakengi, but which I think must be admitted as a new
genus ; as the capsule, seeds, and corolla all differ: the p. alkakengi
is too bitter to be eaten, but the Madeira genus makes tarts of an
agreeable, gooseberry-like flavor0. This is, I believe, the richest vine
• The Herschelia, which I have ventured to erect-into a genus, has, I believe, been
figured by Curtis, as the physalis edulis: it beats very closely upon both 'atiopa ahd
district, and the wine of Torre (which is close to the road on the
eastward) is perhaps the most esteemed of any in the island.
The upper basalt, on the side of the bed of the small torrent,
behind Mr. Veitch’s. Quinta, (2700 feet above the sea,) was in an
advanced state of decomposition ; sometimes indeed being so soft
as to be sectile, which, as I can only attribute it to a continued
action of water, seems to me to indicate that the stream, which
now flows many feet beneath it, has gradually deepened its bed,
leaving the sides which it formerly washed, in the; state we ncrw
find them. The softer parts somewhat resemble the decomposing
basalt above the transition limestone at Lisbon; in. the harder, the
feldspath ground has acquired a light grey colour, and the long
flat crystals of common hornblende imbedded in it, are sometimes
glistening, but more frequently in a'dull mouldering state: the
latter makes a very good building stone. A little Aepatica ( sedg-
wickia hemispherica, fig. 25), which I believe to be quite new, grows
on the borders of the smaller streams'; and in the torrent, I found
the marchantia stellata, which, from the abundance of its brown
physalis: from the first it differs, because its corolla is wheel-shaped and not campanu-
late; the anthera; are oblong; the stigma is not furrowed; the calyx, is bladder-like,
and angular, and always of a pale, but bright green; the stem hairy, and the leaves
alternate: to the physalis it presents the following;contradictions, the Shape o f the
seeds, the position of the leaves, the flowers being always solitary, and the thick
hairiness of the inner part o f the corolla, and of the whole plant:
Genus. Herschelia, Cal. 5-fidus. cor: calyce ultra duplum longior, rotata, quin-
quangulata, lutea, in centro purpurea, intus villosa. Stam. 5, filainenta filiformia,
anthera oblongs. Stig. capitatam. Bacca globosa, carnosa, calyce ampliato, vesi-
cario, angulata, tecta. Semina plurima, compressa, rotunda. Caulis sufirutescens,
subangulatus, villosus. Folia alterna, subcordiformia, acuminata, subintegra, villosa.
Flores solitarii, Sp. 1 . H. edulis.
f Genus. Sedgieickia. Frons aphylla, lobata, glandulis aquosis sparsa. Capsula
in ftonde sessilis, centralis hemispherica. Seminula, nuda, compressa, membranacea,
in hemispherio capsuls. Frondes virides, pulcherrims, fibris capillaribus ad terram
adhserentes. Sp. 1 , S. hemispherica.