Page:Voyage in search of La Perouse, volume 1 (Stockdale).djvu/382

354 singularly facilitated by a quick desiccation. The contrary, however, was so much the case, that I was obliged to make great exertions to save the fruits of my botanical harvest from ruin. In fact, the air, in passing over the waters of the ocean, becomes charged with a degree of humidity, which greatly injures such preparations, and the heat of the climate quickly destroys those plants which are most retentive of their juices.

23d. At four in the morning, we directed our course towards the east.

We had several times to cross the beautiful rivulet, known by the name of Vai-Tomon, which enters the sea a little to the eastward of the town. Its banks were covered with a great number of plants, among which are several species of the jussiæa. I observed on the surface of the brook, the species distinguished by the name of jussiæa tenella; and I admired the precaution taken by nature for its preservation, in disposing along the stalk large oval tubercles, filled with air, to make the plant swim. Those vesicles are but little different from the air-bladders, with which most fish are furnished; only in this instance, each vesicle is composed of a great number of smaller ones; because otherwise they would be in danger of being destroyed, by the shocks of the different bodies brought down by the stream. Notwith-