To the northeast is a solid stemmed Oriental bamboo some thirty feet high which is beginning to rise above the general line of the hammock. The name of this splendid plant is in dispute but the species has been sent out as Dendrocalamus strictus and it will reach a height of fifty feet and even more. Its large stems are crooked at the ground and curve strongly outward until at their ends they are horizontal; their foliage is almost massive, yet it is wonderfully graceful. I never see these immense plumes outlined against the sky but I am reminded of some of the gigantic ferns of the Carboniferous Age.

Around the lawn and in the near foreground a Century plant sends up its great flower stem with candelabra-like branches, just now in full bloom, making a most striking figure against the sky. Near it is a group of palms, a Cuban royal and one from Porto Rico, an African Oil Palm, two species of California Fan palms, a Chamerops from South Europe, the Wine Palm of India (Arenga saccharifera), and an immense-leaved Sabal from South America.

No words can describe the glory and beauty of such a mass of foliage, whether one looks at it from a little distance or from within it, or its wonderful outlines against the sky. The Wine or Sugar Palm is just throwing out an immense new leaf, fully fifteen feet long, and as it is only partly expanded it looks like some gigantic scimitar; but it is a sword of peace and not of war.

Beyond and to the left of this group are three tall pine trees with finely rounded heads, the "Three Graces," and up one of them an American woodbine has climbed to the very tip top. At night their great heads stand out as blots of darkness against the sky. To the west of the house a moonflower has covered a long stretch of fence, a patch of bananas and a large mango tree, and its great white blossoms gleam out like stars in the dawn.

The stars are dimming fast and now the clear note of a Cardinal that has just awakened breaks on the ear, then another and another with a song almost as varied as that of a mocking bird, but in which the peculiar "Chew, chew" is often repeated. Next a mocking bird joins the morning chorus and, in a little while the woods will echo with the sharp cry of the bluejay.

Along the road which encircles the house there is a large Avocado tree on one side and an umbrella China tree on the other, and the latter reaches its branches across until the two meet overhead forming a grand arch. Under this it is still quite dark but there is a lovely vista looking through it towards the northeast. Near it a Dombeya has grown into an immense shrub, and in the winter this will be loaded with large, pendent heads of handsome pink blossoms. Farther on a young tropical almond tree has pushed its whorled horizontal branches across the road and they are overlapping those of a big silk cotton from the West Indies and forming another arch.

To the left is a group of young pine trees, seven in number, - the "Seven Sisters." Up one of them a Stigmaphyllum, a charming vine bearing Orchid-like flowers, is climbing. Up another the great flowered Solatium wendlandi grows; on a third is a scarlet Bougainvillea; a fourth is enveloped by a Kudzu vine and up a fifth a young Faradaya splendens is beginning to twine. On the sixth a Bignonia venusta is gay with gorgeous orange scarlet, tubular blossoms all through the late winter. Over the last of the sisters there sprawls a moon vine that has reached out along the ground and up some of the other trees and threatens to dispute with their occupants for possession. Here is a magnificent Oriental Ficus, F. nymphaefolia, one of the most superb trees I have ever seen with great, nearly round leaves, a foot wide and thirteen inches long that look exactly as though they had just been varnished. Along the road are two species of Hamelia, one of them a native, both having reddish leaves and clusters of handsome orange red flowers; there are Poincianas, Brunfelsias, Clerodendrons and Catesbaeas, the latter with very long, yellow tubular blossoms, and all of these in the glory of full bloom. And this almost overpowering fragrance comes from a night-blooming jasmine which is still exhaling its odor.

Here near the forks of the road is a clump of bananas twenty-five feet across and nearly as high. This is one of the few ornamental species which do well for me (Musa rhodochlamys), a more erect grower than the common fruiting species. Speaking of the banana Kingsley says, "As for the plant no mere words can picture the simple grandeur and grace of a form which startles me whenever I look steadily at it." I wonder why so few people cultivate these glorious plants? This cluster is in a sheltered place and no words can describe the immense, almost entire leaves or their wonderful effect against the morning sky.

Around me on every side is a sea of vegetation, a varied and variegated panorama of fadeless green, and the sun, which has now risen above the hammock, lights it up with wonderful effect. It is a scene of peace and harmony and beauty, a home in which a man may well be content to live, to enjoy nature and end his days.