Then traversed in haste the Savanna so wide,
Till I found the tall pine where you usually hide.
Then I scamper'd away o'er the Indigo fields,
Soon pass'd the old maple, (what sugar it yields!)
I travell'd along to the cabbage-palm quay,
Turn'd short by the far-spreading tall tulip tree.
Through forest and plain, and through dark dismal swamp,
And lighted alone by the firefly's lamp,
Which, fluttering around me, now here and now there,
Rings of gold to my fancy seem'd form'd in the air,
Till now at the brink of the lake I arrive,
Reconnoitre the spot, and prepare for a dive,
Then plunged in the water, and over I swam,
Quickly climb'd the green bank, and so now here I am!

"But I will not detain you with tales of the north,
Of the riches and beauties that nature brings forth;
I should fail in describing what flowers abound,
Rhododendrons and kalmias empurpling the ground;
How the laurels' gay berries, of deep coral red,
Hang far out from their cones on a bright silver thread;
How white lilies, azalias, enliven the green,
But will speak of the south, which will vary the scene.

"The Puma, the Llama, and tapir elate,
Tell their tales of the Mexican gardens and state;
That in midst of a lake those bright swimming isles float,
Which are paddled about like a raft or a boat;
Then they boast of the flowers, the pepper, and maize,
And give one accounts of the natives' strange ways:
If a man be annoy'd by his neighbour, they say,
He will take his plantation and row it away.
The trees are luxuriant, the mora, whose size
Fills the wanderer's mind with delight and surprise;
The ebony, green-heart, and letter-wood tree,
The locust and parasite fig you may see;
On the Concourite's branch Ara parrots assemble,
Whose blue and red feathers the rainbow resemble.
There the trumpeter's sounds and the goatsucker's moans
Are mistaken sometimes for the dying man's groans:
And faintly is heard near the Essequibo
The sad 'whip-poor-will,' and the 'willy-come-go.'"

Here a seal shuffled up, and, just waving his fin,
Requested permission a word to put in.
"Though the beauties of plain and of forest you know,
Yet who can describe all the wonders below?
On a soft bed of sponge in the deep sea I lie,
And watch the huge shark and the grampus glide by;
Or amidst groves of coral I play at bo-peep,
Or I float where the porpoise and flying-f