Copy 1, Volume 1

Oriental memoirs: a narrative of seventeen years residence in India / By James Forbes.

  • James Forbes
Date:
1834
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Oriental memoirs: a narrative of seventeen years residence in India / By James Forbes. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    plants, the profusion of fruits and flowers, and the brilliancy of the birds and insects, afforded an ample scope for my earliest attempts in natural history. One lovely valley, over which the aqueduct passes which supplies the city of St. Sebastian with water, was my favourite place of resort; there the rose and myrtle mingled their fragrance with the clustering blossoms of the citron and orange trees, bending at the same time under the weight of their golden produce. “ For here great Spring Greens all the year, and fruits and blossoms blush, In social sweetness, on the self-same bough.” Milton. Thousands of nature’s choristers, arrayed in all the brilliancy of tropical plumage, enlivened these exten- sive orange groves; and the humming-bird, the smallest and most lovely of the feathered race, buzzed like the bee, while sipping the nectarious dew from the blossoms and flowers. Nothing can exceed the delicacy of these little beauties ; especially of that which from its minuteness is called the fly-bird; its bill and legs are not thicker than a pin ; its head, tufted with glossy jet, varies with every motion into shades of green and purple ; the breast is of a bright flame colour; every feather, when viewed through a microscope, appears as if fringed with silver, and spotted with gold. The serpents in this part of South America are large and noxious, but often beautifully coloured; the town and country are infested with lizards, scor- pions, centipedes, and troublesome insects of various b 2
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