File:The Sherbro and its hinterland (1901) (14760289006).jpg

Identifier: sherbroitshinter00alld (find matches)
Title: The Sherbro and its hinterland
Year: 1901 (1900s)
Authors: Alldridge, T. J. (Thomas Joshua), 1847-1916
Subjects:
Publisher: London, New York : Macmillan and Co., limited New York, The Macmillan Company
Contributing Library: University of California Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: Internet Archive

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even a fair impression ofthe dainty delicacy of the scene. It was more than that—but there I must leave it. The stern of the actual canoe that I used is seen in theright of the picture. FOREST FERNERIES The monotony of bush travelling in the interior is nowand again delightfully relieved by coming upon—oftenquite unexpectedly—a fairyland of inconceivable beauty.Some few travellers have already written of this marvel;but others, who have not been so fortunate as to see it forthemselves, have called in question its existence. I am among the fortunate ones, and have seen it veryfrequently. This fairyland consists of a forest of palmettos,ranging in height from quite low trees up to, say, 30 feet,each tree and intervening shrub being entirely envelopedin masses of a delicate fern resembling our own favourite,the maidenhair. It would be quite impossible for me to describe thecharm of these dainty works of nature. Even my ownnative boys—usually quite indifferent to natural beauty—
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Fig. 22.—TkoiIlal Foli.-\ge. (To/ace/tigc-ii. VIII INDIGENOUS PRODUCTS 79 will gaze amazed at this profusion of loveliness—this com-bination of strength and size with extreme delicacy. To the charm of these stately fern-adorned trees issometimes added silent pools covered with exquisite whitelilies, their blossoms standing up by the hundred on theirbrown-green stems. Amid this pure loveliness of lily and frond, innumerablebutterflies, in endless variety and of the most gorgeouscolouring, dart to and fro, in, as it seems, the veryexuberance of their happiness and freedom. In the bril-liant rays of the tropical sun they shine like jewels, butwith a life, a movement, a flexibility that jewels never have.Some, opals of wonderful transparency and ever-changinghues ; others with wings of lapis lazuli, or of the very skyitself, or of the brightest vermilion thrown into relief byblack spots, and all of form as wonderful as their colourand in endless variety. Whether swallow-tailed, long a

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