Ceiba

“ I have rambled about a good deal in this neighbourhood, and have become acquainted with some of the beautiful trees of the island. Among these I must introduce to you the Ceiba tree, one of the loftiest and most lovely trees of Cuba. It shoots aloft, a strong and softly undulating stem, to a height exceeding that of the palm, and without any branches until, all at once, it spreads out in a horizontal direction three or four arms, sinuous like those of the oak, but less abrupt ”

“ There were giant ceiba trees, with trunks as smooth as if they had been polished by human hands, tremendous cotton-trees, their branches bowed down with air plants, palms, to which clung clusters of wild nuts, thick, bulbous trees, taller trees with buttressed roots, as if Nature knew the strain that was to be placed upon them and braced them up accordingly, trees with bark like mirrors, and trees with six-inch spike growing from the bark. ”

“ He does not change his methods of living, as do other races, but, wherever he goes, he carries from pole to equator the customs and habits of his own country. So he plays golf and cricket and polo in Trinidad, when, at its mildest, the heat is about equal to our August.
It is on this savannah that we have our first good opportunity of viewing the mighty ceiba tree near at hand. You remember it was a great ceiba to which Columbus made fast his ships on the bank of the Ozama River in Santo Domingo? The ceiba may not be the largest tree in the tropics. ”

“ There is apparently no limit to anything in the way of size or beauty under these skies. There may be greater trees in the “High Wood” than the ceiba, but, in our experience, it was by far the most wide-stretching of anything we had yet seen. One stands before it awed, stupefied by its immensity, its age, its strange manner of growing. And we think over all the words we know to express its size and beauty, and we feel so poor and powerless in expression. ”

“ Every house is surrounded by clumps of trees. The ceiba with its large yellow flowers* (* Carnes tollendas, Bombax hibiscifolius.) gives a peculiar character to the landscape, mingling its branches with those of the purple erythrina. This mixture of vivid vegetable colours contrasts finely with the uniform tint of an unclouded sky. In the season of drought, where the burning soil is covered with an undulating vapour, artificial irrigations preserve verdure and promote fertility. Here and there the granite rock pierces through the cultivated ground. ”

“ A giant ceiba, growing in the exact center of the earth, rears its branches through the holes of the heavens until it reaches the seventh, where lives El Gran Dios of the Spaniards; and it is by means of this tree that the spirits of the dead ascend from heaven to heaven. ”

“ A Love Scene under the Ceiba.
The lover who is beloved need never fear disappointment. True to her tryst, and punctual to the time, did the expected sweetheart make her appearance within the glade.
With shy but graceful mien, she advanced towards the ceiba, and with sufficient firmness of step to show that she came not in doubt. A smile, confident and slightly coquettish, dancing in her dark eyes, and playing upon her prettily-curved lips, told of a love already plighted—at the same time betokening full faith in the vows that had been exchanged.
Cubina stepped forth to receive her ”

“ The mahogany boats, however, are rather heavy, while the cedar is liable to split in what is called “beaching.” I have seen dories hollowed from a single trunk of the ceiba, in which a tall man might comfortably lie at length across the bottom, and which were capable of carrying fifty persons.
But the ceibas of our encampment supported, besides their own verdure, a mass of lianes or climbers, of many varieties, as also, numerous parasitic plants, and among them the wild-pine or rain-plant, which served us a most useful purpose. ”

“ The trunk of the ceiba, however, is invaluable to the natives. The wood is easily worked, and is, moreover, light and buoyant, and not liable to split by exposure to the sun. For these reasons, it is principally used for dories, pitpans, and the different varieties of boats required on the coast, although, for the smaller canoes, the cedar and mahogany are sometimes substituted. ”

“ An ash? Something like an ash in growth; but when you look at it through the glasses (indispensable in the tropic forest) , you see that the foliage is more like that of the yellow horse-chestnut. And no British ash, not even the Altyre giants, ever reached to half that bulk. It is a Silk-cotton tree; a Ceiba {79d}—say, rather, the Ceiba of the glen; for these glens have a habit of holding each one great Ceiba, which has taken its stand at the upper end, just where the mountain-spurs run together in an amphitheatre ”

“ No wonder if the man who possessed such a glorious object dared not destroy it, though he spared it for a different reason from that for which the Negroes spare, whenever they can, the gigantic Ceibas, or silk cotton trees. These latter are useless as timber; and their roots are, of course, hurtful to the canes. But the Negro is shy of felling the Ceiba. It is a magic tree, haunted by spirits. There are ‘too much jumbies in him,’ the Negro says; and of those who dare to cut him down some one will die, or come to harm, within the year. In Jamaica, says my friend Mr. ”

“ By the branches of the tree the dead climbed through the series of heavens until they reached the utmost Mayan paradise. There is a tradition that a ceiba grew in Valladolid. It was cut down but sprouted again, having this time four boughs each directed to a cardinal point. A hawk had its home on the highest branch, and the bird was considered to be the spirit of the tree, its cry of "suki, suki," it is said, having given the ancient Indian town Zaci, on the site of which Valladolid was built, its name. ”

“ These details are of vital importance in affirming the existence of Comalcalco at the time of the Conquest, as also that Rio Seco was then a large river whose course was turned by the Spaniards to ruin the Indian city, which rose on its banks.
Of the beauty of the country between Ceiba and Paraïso no words of expression, no painter’s brush could give an adequate idea: noble avenues of cocoa and palm-trees open out at almost every stroke of the oar ”

“ There is another symbol, still venerated among the present indigenous population, which belongs to Nagualism, and is a survival from the ancient cult; this is the Tree. The species held in especial respect is the ceiba, the silk-cotton tree, the ytzamatl (knife-leaved paper tree) of the Nahuas, the yax che (green, or first tree) of the Mayas, the Bombax ceiba of the botanists. It is of great size and rapid growth. In Southern Mexico and Central America one is to be seen near many of the native villages, and is regarded as in some way the protecting genius of the town. ”

“ The tapuyo explained that each new light denoted the uprising of a fresh family, until the whole malocca was astir. The fires were kindled to cook the breakfast of the Indians. Notwithstanding this domestic design, our adventurers looked back upon them with feelings of apprehension; for they were not without fears that, roasted over those very fires, they might furnish the savages with the material for a cannibal repast!
To all appearance never did the ceiba go slower,—never lie so dull upon the water. ”

“ But seen from a little distance, the ceiba-tree in bloom is one of the most splendid productions of Nature—a gigantic bouquet, which requires a whole forest to supply the contrasting green! The flowers are rapidly succeeded by a multitude of pods, which grow to the size and shape of a goose-egg. When ripe, they burst open, revealing the interior filled with a very [185] soft, light cotton or silky fibre, attached as floats to diminutive seeds, which are thus wafted far and wide by the winds. ”

“ It is a well-ascertained fact that an appellation given in honour of a great event to a certain spot lives on when the object which gave rise to it has perished. Is it so unreasonable to suppose Pg 192that the Spaniards who settled later at Ceiba, a spot consecrated by the taking of possession, on identifying Cortez’ tree, should name the village they erected after it? If I make a running comment on history, if I discover points of analogy at every step, I do so whilst visiting carefully the very places under notice, bearing in mind historical accounts. ”

“ We leave Bellote en route for Paraïso, following the course of Tomo, Largo, and calling at Ceiba, a small hamlet standing amidst a glorious landscape. Here once rose Cintla, a dependency of Tabasco, and this is the river which Grijalva discovered, which Cortez navigated, and on the banks of which he fought his great battle, against 40,000 or 50,000 Indians. Many are the proofs which can be brought to confirm our opinion: this river has but one mouth, and therefore can at no time have borne the name of Las Dos Bocas ”

“ The ceiba is the wild cotton-tree and grows to an enormous size.
[IV‐15] Bernal Diaz' memory has here failed him. He states that after crossing the Lempa they entered the Chaparristic—called by him Chapanastiques—province, and that here the Indians killed a Spaniard named Nicuesa, and wounded three others of his party who were foraging for provisions. The Spaniards had passed through the Chaparristic province when they had reached the Lempa, and therefore it was either in Cuzcatlan that Nicuesa was killed, or the river which Alvarado's men crossed must have been the Goascoran. ”

“ Here also are a couple of remarkable ceiba trees, the one on account of its beauty, the other for its deformity—its tragical combat with the parasite. The sugar-cane fields are enclosed with lofty, untrimmed hedges in which grow wild orange and various tropical trees.
During the hottest part of the forenoon I sit quietly in my own light, excellent chamber, writing and drawing. Just before dinner I go out, look around me in the bohea, or seat myself under a mango-tree on a cross road to catch a few breezes, if I can, in its shade. In the afternoon I generally drive out with Mrs. ”

“ The whole terrace was covered with trees, and even at this height from the ground were two gigantic Ceibas, or wild cotton-trees, above twenty feet in circumference, extending their half-naked roots fifty or a hundred feet around, binding down the ruins, and shading them with their wide-spreading branches. We sat down on the very edge of the wall, and strove in vain to penetrate the mystery by which we were surrounded. Who were the people that built this city? In the ruined cities of Egypt, even in the long-lost Petra, the stranger knows the story of the people whose vestiges are around him. ”

“ These trees, naturally slow growers, must be over a century in age, and afford, by their widespread branches, a shade equally graceful and grateful. Like the india-rubber trees of Asia, these ceibas have at least one half of their anaconda-like roots exposed upon the surface of the ground, dividing the lower portion of the stem into supporting buttresses, a curious piece of finesse on the part of nature to overcome the disadvantage of insufficient soil. The tree bears annually a large seed-pod, packed with cotton of a soft, silky texture, and hence its name. ”

“ This characteristic applies even to the small grove round the ruins at Copan; and although I had learnt to identify a few of the most noticeable trees, I could only find a few examples of each amongst the many trees around us, and to my untrained eye all the remainder appeared to differ from one another. The monarchs of the grove were two giant Ceibas, to whose beauty and grandeur I can do no justice with words. A tent might be pitched between the buttresses from which the mighty shaft of such a giant springs, and a regiment might camp beneath its branches. ”

“ Cebu.Cebu (with a population of 34,000) is the chief town of the island of the same name, the seat of Government and of the bishop of the Bisayas, and within forty-eight hours from Manila by steamer. It is as favorably situated with regard to the eastern portion of the Bisayan group as Iloilo is for the western, and is acquiring increased importance as the emporium for its products. Sugar and tobacco are obtained from Bohol; rice from Panay; abacá from Leyte and Mindanao; and coffee, wax, Spanish cane, and mother-of-pearl from Misamis (Mindanao) . ”

“ The whole coast of upper Peru—now called Bolivia—is arid and desert; so much so, that the celebrated president Santa Cruz—who, much to the prejudice of Arica, [34] made Cobija a free port for the introduction of merchandise,—found that he could not, by sinking pits in the deep sands of Cobija, come at a supply of good water. [35] For want [218] of water and lucern, mules from the interior of Bolivia often die at the sea-port of Cobija; for there is no vegetation within a great distance from this place. ”

“ A son was born to them,—so beautiful a boy that the sun god made a land for him, stocked it with living creatures, adorned it with greenery and flowers, and gave it to the human race as an inheritance of joy forever. This land he called Cebu, and no land was more lovely. Lupa was the child, and from him came all the kings of Cebu, among them Amambar, the first chief of the island of whom we have definite record. ”