NOTES.

NOTE, p. 139, 1. 3.

Fresh from pimento's groves that grew.'

'THE pimento trees grow spontaneously, and in great abundance, in many parts of Jamaica, but more particularly on hilly situations near the sea, on the northern side of the island, where they form the most delicious groves that can possibly be imagined, filling the air with fragrance, and giving reality, though in a very distant part of the globe, to our great poet's descriptions of those balmy gales which convey to the delighted voyager

"Sabean odours from the spicy shore

Of Araby the bless'd.

Cheer'd with the grateful smell, old ocean smiles " I do not believe that there is, in all the vegetable creation, a tree of greater beauty than a young pimento. The trunk, which is of a grey colour,

smooth and shining, and altogether free of bark, rises to the height of fifteen or twenty feet. It then branches out on all sides, richly clothed with leaves of a deep green, somewhat like those of the bay tree; and these, in the months of July and August, are beautifully contrasted and relieved by an exuberance of white flowers. It is remarkable, that the leaves are equally fragrant with the fruit; and, I am told, yield in distillation a delicate odoriferous oil, which is very commonly used in the medical dispensaries of Europe for oil of cloves.' Edwards's Hist. of the West Indies, 8vo, vol. ii. p. 297.

NOTE b, p. 139, 1. 9.

Under the banyan's pillar'd shade.'

This monarch of the woods,' says Mr. Edwards, in his elegant history, whose empire ex

tends over Asia and Africa, as well as the tropi cal parts of America, is described by our divine poet with great exactness.

"The fig-tree, not that kind for fruit renown'd,
But such as at this day to Indians known
In Malabar and Decan, spreads his arms,
Branching so broad and long, that in the ground
The bearded twigs take root, and daughters grow
Above the mother tree; a pillar'd shade
High over-arch'd, and echoing walks between."
Paradise Lost, book ix.

It is called in the East Indies, the 'banyan tree.' Mr. Marsden gives the following account of the dimensions of one near Mangee, twenty miles west of Patna in Bengal. Diameter, 363 to 375 feet; circumference of the shadow at noon, 1116 feet; circumference of the several stems, in number fifty or sixty, 921. Hist. Sumatra, p. 131.

NOTE , p. 140, 1. 5.

Humm'd soft the bird o' peerless plume.'

'The humming bird, the most beautiful as well as the most diminutive of the feathered race, is fond of building its nest in the tamarind, orange, or bastard cedar-trees; on account, I should suppose, of the superabundance of their shade. The

nest is made with particular art and beauty. The workmanship, indeed, is no less exquisite than wonderful, and seems to be, in an essential manner, adapted as the residence of this interesting and lovely bird.' Beckford's Descriptive Account of the Island of Jamaica. For a more particular description, see vol. i. p. 363, 8vo edition, of the same work.

NOTE 4, p. 140, 1. 10.

'Bepictur'd o'er.'

The following very animated, though inflated description of a tropical sky at sunset, is taken from the same author: Of the picturesque representation of the clouds in Jamaica, there is an almost daily and unspeakable variety; and the sunset of that climate has charms to arrest the regard, and fix the attention, of every beholder. At this period, when the sun-beams linger on the mountains, and seem reluctantly to withdraw their glories from the plain; when they just begin to die away in the horizon, or glitter by re

flection upon the trembling wave;-what delightful appearances, or glowing with lustre, or softened by shade, may not be imagined or lamented in the evanescent clouds of that warm and vapoury region! What imaginary islands, with all the discriminations of hill and dale, of light and gloom, of bays and promontories, of rocks and woods, of rivers and seas, may not be traced in the transcendently beautiful skies of that fervent climate, and treasured up for future embellishments, by those who study nature, and who delight to copy her charms, not only in her elevation, but decline!' Vol. i. p. 80.

NOTE, p. 141. 1. 4.

The fire-flies gleam.'

In the mountainous and interior parts of the larger islands, innumerable fire-flies abound at night, which have a surprising appearance to a stranger. They consist of different species, some of which emit a light, resembling a spark of fire, from a globular prominence near each eye; and