T 2&, v\jH Sfaui fork i>tate (^allege of Agriculture JU (Jfarncll Jltuueratty 3tl)ara, TS. % Sltbrarg Cornell University Library QH 81S37 Cornell University Library The original of this book is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924001183353 BOHN'S SCIENTIFIC LIBRARY. THE EARTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. THE MINERAL KINGDOM. EARTH, PLANTS, AND IAN. POPULAR PICTURES OF NATURE. JOACHIM FREDERIC SCHOUW, PROFESSOR OF BOTANY IK THE UNIVERSITY OF COPENHAGEN. SKETCHES FROM THE MINERAL KINGDOM. FRANCIS VON KOBELL. TRANSLATED AND EDITED BY ABTHTTR HENPEEY, E.E.S., F.L.S., &c. LECTURER ON BOTANY AT ST. GEORGE'S HOSPITAL, AUTHOR OF "THE YEGETAT1GN OF EUROPE," &C. &C, ■ ■ '■-: k $.h_it.\ ■ '■ . LONDON: HENRY G. BOHN, YORK-STREET, COVENT GARDEN. « 1852. qH81 At WHITING, BEAUFOKT HOUSE, STiUND. PREFACE, The Author of " The Earth, Plants, and Man" is so well known to all who have made any acquaintance with Physical Geography, that no apology seems necessary in presenting a work of his to English readers,— the less when it is one so entertaining and instructive as the present. Some of Professor Schouw's views respecting the origin and early history of plants are opposed to those entertained by many distinguished naturalists ; a few of these cases have been briefly indicated in notes. The present translation is from the German version, in the preparation of which the Author co-operated, and which, therefore, is regarded as equivalent to the original. Most of his works have been published in this way, owing to the comparatively narrow circle of Danish readers out of the country. Kobell' s interesting " Sketches from the Mineral Kingdom' ' have been appended to the preceding work, since the subject, mode of treatment, and manner of original production, viz., as public Lectures, seemed to render them a desirable addition. A. H. CONTENTS. THE EARTH, PLANTS, AND MAN, PAGE 1. Plants of former Epochs .... .1 II. Further Contributions to the History of Plants 8 III. The Origin of Existing Vegetation . 1 7 IV. The Pompeian Plants . . . 31 V. Rain ... . . . 37 VI. The Italian Malaria 45 VII. Repetitions of Nature in the Vegetable Kingdom . 57 VIII. The Alpine Plants 63 IX. Mountain Rambles in the North and South . . 69 X. Etna. ... . 78 XI. Rambles in the Karst . . . 86 XII. ' Capri and Ischia ... ... 92 XIII. Nature in the South Sea Islands . . .97 XIV. The Trollhatta Fall 109 XV. The Part played by Forests in Nature and in Human Life . .114 XVI. The Geography of the Bread-Plants . . .130 XVn. The Geographical Distribution of the most important Ornamental Plants . . . . .14 5 XVHI. The Coffee-Tree . . .152 XIX. The Sugar-Cane . . .163 XX. The Vine . . . . . 169 XXI. The Tea-Shrub . 177 XXH. The Cotton-Plant . . 186 XXIH. Flax . 193 XXIV. The Pepper-Plant . . . .199 XXV. The Clove-tree and the Nutmeg-tree . . . .203 XXVI. The Tobacco-Plant ... ... 208 XXVH. The Mistletoe .... . .214 XXVHI. Characteristic Plants of Nations ... .221 XXIX. The Action of the Human Race upon Nature . . 228 XXX. Nature and Nations .... 240 SKETCHES FKOM THE MINERAL KINGDOM. I. Precious Stones 249 II. Ordinary Stones . 278 III. Precious Metals . 324 IV. Ordinary Metals . . . . . 355 THE EARTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. CHAPTER I. THE P1ANTS OF FOB.MEB, EPOCHS. Rocks contain remains of the animals of past ages, and a vegetable world also lies buried under our feet. When we examine a piece of brown coal from Iceland, we see clearly that it is wood (used even for fuel), yet it occurs in layers alternately with those of a rock. The fibres are distinguish- able in petrified wood ; entire stems with branches exist in our collections ; but the vegetable structure is converted into hard stone, which sometimes, in the form of calcedony, horn-stone, and opal, strikes fire with steel. Iu clay-slate we find enclosed leaves, so well preserved that we can dis- tinguish the ramifications of the veins in them. These examples are not selected from contemporaneous ■ plants ; these vegetables belonged to different periods of the world's history, for the strata lying between them contain sea-shells, mollusks and fishes, and demonstrate that the plants in the older (more deeply situated) layers must have been destroyed, before those which occur in the more recent were formed. I must not here enter into a complete description of the different systems of vegetation which have successively existed in the various periods. The comprehension of this would re- quire a previous acquaintance both with the rocky strata and the principal forms of plants. I will confine myself to the oldest period of all, and this the rather, that it is the best known, and. at the same time the most characteristic. When we investigate the many different strata which lie one above another, we find that those situated lowest down, although partly deposited from water, do not contain the slightest trace of animals or plants ; this is the case, for ex- B 2 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. ample, with many clay-slates ; we call these primitive rocks, and include with them those which, having been formed under the action of fire, cannot contain any organic remains. Hence we conclude that no animals or plants existed in the periods in which such rocks were formed. Upon the primitive rocks rest certain others, in which the vegetable kingdom is represented only by fucoids (sea- weeds), while they contain abundance of marine animals. These formations, of vast thickness, have been greatly in- vestigated of late years, but little has been revealed in them interesting to the botanist ; and it is not until we leave these, the older and middle palaeozoic rocks, that we arrive in the new palaeozoic period at a system containing a vast quantity of vegetable remains. The most characteristic rocks of this series are those connected with the coal formations, and the period in which they were formed has been called the coal period. In the strata of this period great abundance of animal and vegetable remains are met with. The coal lies in layers (seams), alternating repeatedly with sandstone and shale. The vegetable remains occur most abundantly in the shale and iron-stone. The leaves and twigs rest closely one upon another ; but their remains are also met with in the sandstone, and entire stems of considerable length (40 — 50 feet) are sometimes found standing quite upright in this. The coal itself must also be regarded as composed of altered vegetable structures, although great doubt may exist as to the mode in which it was formed. We have here the choice of two hypotheses : either the coal-beds have been formed of vast masses of trunks of trees, which have been carried along by streams and deposited in the places where the coal is now found ; or they have originated in these spots, in a manner similar to that in which peat is formed in our own times. We have examples in the drift-wood in the North American and North Asiatic rivers, that such depositions of trunks of trees are capable of forming vast compacted lajrers which re- main fixed upon the soil of the river-banks ; this is seen in the Mississippi, where they are driven on to the banks, and are sometimes arrested there, sometimes again carried off by the stream during floods ; they are frequently even quite overgrown with herbs and bushes. Bat the first view is opposed by the circumstance that leaves and twigs are not THE PLANTS OF EOEMEE EPOCHS. 3 unusually well preserved ; while the fact that trunks of trees are found standing upright, speaks in favour of the coal having been formed in situ. Whichever of these two assumptions we accept, the pressure from above and the subterranean heat below suffice to explain the carbonization. Investigating the plants of which the shale furnishes abundant remains, we arrive at the remarkable conclusion, that a decided majority of them, perhaps two-thirds of the number of species, and four-fifths of that of the individual specimens, belong to one single, very strongly marked famil)' of plants, the ferns. The ferns, as we at present know them, are distinguished by their leaves, which are rolled up in a spiral line before they are unfolded ; further by the fact, that although the leaves are highly developed, they bear no true flowers, but present a kind of small fruit seated upon the back of the leaves, con- taining extremely minute seeds of very simple structure. In cold climates the ferns are only herbaceous, but in the torrid zone they present themselves in the form of trees of con- siderable height, with palm-like, unbranched trunks ; these trunks are clothed with the remains of fallen leaves, and thus they acquire a scaly or tesselated surface. In the shales we find not only fern-leaves, which are readily recognized by their forms and the branching of their veins, but also trunks, which, like the fern-stems of the torrid zone qf the present day, are clothed with the remains of leaves, and unbranched. The ferns play a much more subordinate part among the vegetation of the present time ; they consti- tute scarcely a thirty-fifth or a fortieth part of all known species, and hardly bear a greater proportion in number of individuals to the entire vegetation of the globe. The second family found in the coal-formations, is that of the Lycopodiaceae, or club-mosses, and these exhibit a much greater difference from existing conditions in regard to the part they play. Those we meet with living now are dwarf plants, resembling mosses, of such small size and number, that, generally speaking, they are only noticed by the bo- tanist ; they consist of small, usually branched stems, with scale-like leaves lying over one another, like tiles, upon the stem ; like the ferns, they do not bear true flowers, but little b2 4 THE EARTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. fruits between the leaves. Among the remains of the ancient world this family appears much more frequently than at pre- sent, for about a quarter of the known ancient species belong- to it. And they present themselves as arborescent plants, with branched trunks as much as sixty or seventy feet high ; so that they were giants in proportion to the existing plants of this family. The third family of the coal-formation, is that of the Equisetaceae, or horse-tails. This group is distinguished by jointed, furrowed stems, with branches jointed and fur- rowed in like manner standing in circles ; little scale-like leaves which are coalescent into sheaths ; absence of proper flowers, which are represented by fruits seated on the under surface of little shield-shaped bodies. They are usually hei'bs of moderate height ; the largest attain but a few feet, and they perform an unimportant part in vegetation generally. The coal-formation exhibits large and arborescent trunks, indicating by the peculiar and very regular manner in which the farrows alternate in the contiguous joints that they belong to this family. We find these trunks ten feet high, and five or six inches in diameter. But this family is less numerous than the two preceding ; it exists now as an isolated and very peculiar form, which it is a matter of difficulty to refer to a suitable place among other plants. These three families include almost three-quarters of the species of the coal period, and a far larger proportion of the individual specimens. The remainder belong to the gymno- spermous Dicotyledons (Conifers, &c). No other Dicotyle- dons appear to occur, and the Monocotyledons are either en- tirely wanting, or only very sparingly met with. But it may, perhaps, be asked how we know that there were not other plants which, having been completely destroyed, have left no traces of their existence. "We certainly cannot oppose any definite facts to this objection ; but it is in the highest degree probable that no other vegetables existed ; for we find no structure in the leaf or the trunks of the ferns which could account for their being preserved better than the leaves of other plants or trees, and we do find in the more recent strata many stems and leaves, belonging to the vege- table forms now prevailing, which are not met with in the THE PLANTS OP FOBMEE EPOCHS. 5 coal period, without any reason presenting itself why they should have been preserved in the more recent, in preference to the older, strata. "We can therefore demonstrate, or at least assume it as highly probable, that the three families in question, which all belong to one natural ■primary group, of which we are ac- quainted with at least three hundred species from the coal period, constituted a greatly preponderating part of the entire vegetation. At the present time these three families form, perhaps, scarcely one-thirtieth of the vegetable world, this being now represented by several hundred families, or dif- ferent primary forms. A high degree of uniformity, or monotony, may conse- quently be named as the chief feature of the vegetation of that age ; considered in this point of view it may be com- pared with our pine forests or heaths, remembering, however, that they exhibited greater variations in the subordinate forms ; something akin, therefore, to what is seen in the pine forests of North America, or the heaths of the Cape, which are composed of numerous species. The uniformity shows itself also in another respect ; for the same plants which are found in the English coal measures, are met with not only in Belgium and on the Rhine, but in North Ame- rica ; thus in countries which at present possess a very dif- ferent vegetation. The second great feature in the vegetation of the coal period, is the absence of true floivers ;* a trait which is the more worthy of note, when we recollect that not only our herbs of the fields, meadows, and marshes, but also the bushes in our thickets and the trees of our forests, all possess flowers. The presence of flowers is rightly regarded as the mark of the higher development of the plant ; we therefore account the flowerless plants less perfect, even when other organs, such as the leaf, have attained a considerable development, which is actually the case in the ferns. Since the coal period thus affords only flowerless plants, while the more recent periods present vegetation with flowers, we have iu this a new confirmation of the interesting fact to which we are conducted * We do, indeed, meet with traces of reproductive organs in these families j particularly germens, and sometimes even a surrounding envelope, — but these organs are not perfectly developed in any of them. b THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. by the study of animal remains, that the living creation has been developed historically to greater perfection. The absence of fleshy, juicy fruits, is another feature which essentially distinguishes that vegetation from the present ; as also, apparently, does the want of graminaceous plants ; for the traces which some have imagined that they found of plants of the grass family, are doubtful and of sparing oc- currence. Thus we see, that the vegetation of that period was in the highest degree uniform, exhibited no true flowers, no succu- lent fruit, and no kind of grass, but almost exclusively ferns and a few allied plants. Let us proceed, however, to acquire an idea of the appearance of nature at that time. I have already mentioned that the ferns now constitute but a small part of the vegetable world. It must be noted here, however, that this only holds in its full extent of the vegetation as a whole ; certain local conditions exist under which the ferns play a much more important part. Thus the ferns constitute one-eighth of the vegetation of the islands of Jamaica, Mauritius, and Bourbon ; of that of the Society Islands, as much as one-sixth ; in New Zealand the vegetation is principally composed of ferns, which clothe the earth in place of grasses ; even in the small islands of Ascen- sion, Tristan d'Acunha, and St. Helena, the ferns, together with the other two families, form almost one-half of the very poor and uniform vegetation. Since all these places are islands, and all lie in a warm climate, we are quite warranted in supposing that those plants grew upon islands, and that the climate was warm during the coal period. "We may also arrive at the latter result in another way. We have seen that many of the ferns of ancient times were arbores- cent ; at the present time we find tree-ferns only in warm climates. Turning to the animal world of the oldest period of living creatures, we find a countless abundance of corals, radiata and marine mollusca (marine univalves, bivalves, and cephalopods, allied to the cuttle-fishes, the last far more abundant and in greater number of species, which are of gigantic size compared with those of the present time) . "We also find many crus- taceous animals and traces of fishes. On the other hand, we miss all traces of remains of mammalia and birds ; nay, even THE PLANTS OP EOBMEB EPOCHS. 7 of reptiles* Thus the forests were without birds, without the apes, now so numerous in hot countries, and without snakes. In this way we arrive at a not very imperfect picture of nature in the time of the older coal period. Islands rising out of a vast ocean, with a warm climate, an uniform forest vegetation chiefly composed of ferns, without flowers and grass, without juicy fruits, without snakes and lizards, and also without the song of birds, the voices of animals, or of man. Further than this we may not go. It is true that pictures of the landscapes of the ancient world have been presented to us ; these, however, are not from the pencil of a painter of the ancient world, but of a naturalist of the present time, and we cannot answer for their verisimilitude. Perhaps it may be asked : why were not these islands, endowed with a mild climate and a rich though uniform vegetation, destined for the abode of human beings ? I might answer, that it was necessary that the house should be fully prepared before the master was invited to inhabit it, and that a country without domestic animals, a field without flowers, a wood without birds, a climate warm indeed, but probably unhealthy, would be no desirable abode. But I prefer to leave the question unanswered, and to own, that although we are often able to perceive in Utile things the regulation by law which rules in the household of nature, our conclusions become adventurous and faulty when we deal with the grand plans laid down by the Lawgiver of Nature ; and we should here rather own at once, that with all our cleverness, we are only children feeling our way about. (* This is incorrect — traces of reptiles, in one case the skeleton, have lately been met with in rocks still older than the coal-formations ; facts which strongly support the arguments which have recently been advanced against some of the hypotheses of the defenders of the historical development theories. — Ed.) 8 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. CHAPTEE II. FtTETHEE CONTBIBUTIONS TO THE HISTOEY Or PLANTS. In the preceding chapter, we have attempted to give a picture of the oldest vegetation. It must be admitted, this sketch can have no pretension to perfect accuracy ; yet it appears that both the memorials of that period (namely, the remains of plants and animals buried in the bosom of the earth), and the conclusions which may be drawn from them, are of a character which aifords something bordering upon certainty ; and it will certainly be allowed, that we have arrived at a greater degree of clearness in regard to this part of the most remote history of plants, than has been attained in respect to the primitive history of the human race. But a vegetation such as- we have described, existed only in the oldest period. Between that and the present lie several, perhaps many, vegetable systems, differing not only from that, but from ours and from each other. As it happens not unfrequently in the history of the human race, and in the history of particular races, that an older period is better elucidated, and lies more clearly before us, than a more recent ; so also, in the present condition of science at least, the vegetation of the coal period is much better known than those which are presented by the more recent periods of the earth. . Since, therefore, in a popular exposition of the ac- quisitions of science, only that should be included which is complete or to a tolerable degree certain, I am compelled to confine myself to a few general remarks in respect to the suc- ceeding periods. In the vegetation of our own time there exist four great primary groups. The first, which we will here call the leaf- less 'plants, are devoid not only of flowers and seeds, but we may say that they have neither stem nor leaf; for either the organs of the plants, as, for instance, in the Fungi, bear no resemblance to the organs of other plants, or the stem and leaves are, so to speak, blended into one, as is the case in the sea-weeds. The second group may be called the flower- less plants. We are partly acquainted with these through the preceding chapter ; they include the ferns and the plants allied to these ; they possess roots, stem, leaves, and FURTHEB CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE HISTOET OF PLANTS. 9 organs resembling seeds, but have not perfectly-developed flowers. The last two primary groups agree in all the plants having flowers and seeds, and are principally distinguished by the one, to which, for example, the grasses, lilies, and palms belong, exhibiting a predominance of the number three in the parts of the flowers and fruit, while the number five prevails in the other ; the former have three or six leaves in the perianth, three, six, or nine stamens; and frequently a three or six- chambered fruit ; the latter generally present five or ten sepals and petals, five, ten, or twenty stamens, and often a five-chambered fruit, as in the apple. These two groups are also distinguishable by their leaves, which, in the former, are almost always long, narrow, undivided, and traversed only by longitudinal veins ; while in the latter, they are frequently broad, divided, and exhibit a net-like intercommunication of their veins. The former are called Monocotyledons, the latter Dicotyledons (ternary and quinary plants). Taken as a whole, the latter group must be regarded as the most per- fectly developed. The first main-group contains, for the most part, plants which would readily disappear during a revolution of nature ; this is probably the cause why, on the whole, but few traces of them are met with in the strata, yet the number of sea- weeds is not inconsiderable. The second main-group appears as the predominant in the coal period, in which the great majority of the plants belong to this division. In the more recent periods, first appear the naked-seeded Dicotyledons, namely, the Cycadacese, Conifer*, and certain families now lost. In the later periods the rest of the Dicotyledons pre- sent themselves, and gradually increase, so that in the most recent period their numerical proportion corresponds to that in existing vegetation. The vegetable thus appears, like the animal kingdom, to have been gradually developed to a more compound, to a more perfect structure. Since the less-developed forms persisted after the more developed made their appearance, it is readily seen that vege- tation has become more varied in proportion to the proxi- mity of the period to the present time. The nearer the periods lie to the present, the greater be- 10 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. comes the resemblance of the vegetable remains met with, to existing plants, and in some of the most recent strata we find plants which cannot be distinguished from those of the pre- sent time. After this brief survey of the order in which the various forms of plants have originated, we have still a great question in the history of plants to answer, namely : in what manner have they originated ? This, however, is one of those pro- blems which will probably for ever lie beyond human powers of conception. Creation itself is the great enigma, which no one has solved, and it is unlikely any one ever will. That which takes place before our eyes, offers nothing similar from which we can draw probable conclusions ; and the two hypotheses which have been formed in regard to it, are equally inconceivable, according to what happens at the present day ; these are : either the organised creatures (plants and animals), all originated at once from inorganic bodies (water, earth, air, or from the particular substances of which these, or the organic bodies themselves are composed), or, only the lower creatures originated in this manner, and the more complex were developed from them by modification and transformation ; for example, a moss from a fungus, or herb from a moss ; an insect from a worm, a fish from a mollusk, &c. For we have no certain fact whatever to prove, either that an organic body, even of the lowest grade, can originate from inorganic bodies or substances ; or that one species of animal or plant is capable of transformation into another ; neither do the fossil remains of plants and animals bear out the last supposition. For example, we find that the many teeth and bones of the extinct elephants (mammoth) are always the same, and exhibit no transition of structure to- ward that of the teeth and bones of the existing elephants. And there is just as little trace of transition between the extinct and existing rhinoceroses, &c. Therefore, we are com- pelled to say, that forces have been at work in ancient times, which are now no longer in action. But it will, perhaps, be asked, is creation at an end ? Has no new plant appeared during the historical period ; do not new species of plants, perhaps, still come into existence ? I believe that this question can be answered in the nega- tive, if we exclude from our consideration those modifications TTTETHEB CONTEIBTJTIONS TO THE HISTORY OF PLANTS. 11 which have been produced, either mediately or immediately, through the influence of man. The first method by which we may arrive at the answer is, to mark how parts of the earth's surface, formerly bare of vegetation, have gradually acquired one. This occurs when lava-streams, which have flowed from craters, through vol- canic eruptions, by degrees become covered with plants ; it happens on volcanic islands which are protruded from the sea ; or coral islands which are gradually elevated above the surface of the ocean ; and on tracts of sea-bottom which are dyked in and drained. Standing upon the summit of Etna, a giant mountain, forming a single cone more than ninety miles in circum- ference at the base, and 11,000 feet high, lava-streams are seen stretching in all directions along its sides, having flowed down like rivers ; and these are especially perceptible where they break through the zone of trees which girdles the mountain about half way up. These lava-streams are of very different ages. We possess historical data and reports con- cerning the origin of the more recent. By investigating and comparing these lava-streams, we have an opportunity of seeing how the vegetation is gradually formed ; some are still quite naked ; others have only a few plants scattered here and there in hollows and crevices ; and hi others, a layer of decaying vegetation is beginning to form mould, in which, more and more plants can by degrees strike root. The lava upon Vesuvius, Isehia, and other volcanoes, exhibits the same phenomena as the lava-streams of Etna. According to my own observations, the plants which first settle upon the naked lava, are especially those lower plants which are called lichens.* Certain succulent and fleshy plants, chiefly nourished by the aqueous vapour of the air, which they absorb by the stem and leaves, are among the earliest inha- bitants of lava-streams ; and this is especially the case with the cactus, or Indian fig, as it is called {Optmtia vulgaris), upon Etna ; it is, indeed, industriously planted on the lava, in order to render it fertile. But these plants which thus arise upon the lava are not new species ; they are found not only upon the older lava-streams, but also in other soils, not * Slereocauhn paschale, in particular, is very general upon Vesuvius and Isehia. 12 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. volcanic ; the Indian fig, as it is termed, is, in fact, an exotic in Sicily, derived originally from America. The same is the case in the coral islands of the South Sea. At first an island of this kind is bare ; gradually it becomes clothed with plants which are found upon older islands, and upon the continent of Asia. The two plants which consti- tute the mass of the vegetation of the lower coral islands, are the cocoa-nut palm and Barringtonia speciosa ; but the fruits of these two plants are seen floating in abundance on the surface of the ocean ; they are especially adapted for this, since in the cocoa-nut the nut is enclosed in a particularly hard shell excluding the air, the shell again having a fibrous coat, which renders the fruit comparatively light ; the other is also exceedingly well protected and buoyant. The remark- able poverty in forms displayed by the South Sea islands, in contrast to the rich vegetation elsewhere met with in a hot, and at the same time moist climate, must be ascribed, at least in part, to the circumstance that nature no longer pro- duces new species. This is seen again in various little volcanic islands in the South Atlantic Ocean, which have probably been elevated above the sea in recent periods ; for instance, in Tristan dAcunha, and St. Helena. "When Europeans first visited them, these islands presented very few plants ; but introduced plants, and the weeds accompanying them, have multiplied there in an astonishing manner, and to an extent of which countries where the soil was already stocked with other plants present no example. Lastly, the same occurs also on tracts reclaimed from the sea, on land enclosed by dykes. We have an interesting ex- ample of this in the island of Punen. A little bay of the Odenseefiord was dyked in about thirty years ago. One of the landowners resident there is fortunately a meritorious botanist, M. Hofman. He has been very attentive to the overgrowing of the reclaimed land, and kept a journal of the changes which occurred upon the tract converted from sea- bottom into dry land. A scientific and friendly contest arose between my friend and myself, whether the plants which gradually came to light in this way, originated from seeds which had come in one way or another on to the reclaimed land, or owed their existence to the so-called spontaneous FURTHER CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE HISTORY OF PLANTS. 13 origin (equivocal generation), which latter opinion was main- tained by M. Hofman. Whichever opinion be adopted, this much is certain, that the newly originated plants were not new species; so that we have here again, as it appears, an evidence that the natural forms now at work are incapable of producing new ones. Another way in which we can at least approximate to an answer to the question, is by comparing the floras of the present with those of the past, within the limits of historical time. About one hundred and sixty years ago, in the time of Christian V., there lived in Copenhagen a skilful botanist called Peter Kylling. He industriously investigated the forest of Charlottenland, situated a mile from the town, and compiled a catalogue of the plants which he found in this wood. Comparing this with the plants now growing there, we find that the vegetation of that time must have been the same. It is true, we now find certain plants there which were not mentioned by Kylling ; but these are either such as so closely resemble nearly allied species, that the distinction may have been readily overlooked ; or they are so small and so incon- spicuous, that they may have been passed unobserved on this account ; or, finally, they are plants which it is highly pro- bable have been introduced by the aid of man. We come to the same conclusion when we take up Kyllmg's " Vindarium," or his catalogue of plants found in Denmark, with Hornemann's "Study of Plants," written one hundred and fifty years later, or when we compare the oldest German or Italian "Floras," which go back two hundred or two hundred and fifty years, with the existing Floras of these countries. It may be objected that the interval of time is too short here. Well, we can go back still further, and direct our in- quiries to the reports of the botanists of antiquity, relating to the most important plants in the different countries known in those times. Among these authors, Theophrastus of Lesbos, who lived three hundred years before the birth of Christ, deserves especial attention, because his descriptions are the most accurate, and his statements the most trustworthy. Such comparisons certainly present not a few difficulties ; the ancients did not add any drawings to their descriptions, and the latter were not written with the accuracy and defini- 14 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. tion of the descriptions of plants drawn up now ; thus great doubt often prevails as to what plant they have meant to indicate. But if we keep to the plants which, from their size or abundance, or through the importance of their applica- tions, have occupied the chief place, the uncertainty is con- siderably diminished ; and we have grounds for assuming that, so far as nature has been left to itself, the agreement between the vegetation of antiquity and that of the present day is most striking. According to Theophrastus, as also according to Hero- dotus, Egypt presented the Arabic gum-tree, the sycamore, the papyrus, the lotus-plant, and the date-palm, which are also now the plants characterising that country. The The- baic or Doum palm, as it is called (Gucifera Thebaicd), re- markable for its branched trunk, grew of old in Upper, but not in Lower Egypt ; the same is just the case now. The ancients mentioned as the characteristic plants of India, the bamboo-cane, the cotton-tree, the canella-tree, rice, the pepper, the cardamum, the banyan-tree, and several others ; which are likewise so now. Among the products of Arabia mentioned by the ancients, are the myrrh and the balsam- plants ; which are now, also, characteristic of these regions. The Flora of Southern Europe is very different from that of Northern Europe ; the Balkan Mountains, the Alps, and the Pyrenees here form a natural barrier. Among the plants which especially distinguish the vegetation of the South from that of Northern Europe, are the many evergreen-trees — the ilex, the cork oak, the myrtle, the laurel, the arbutus, the oleander, &c. ; and these are cited by the old Greek and Roman authors, as the common trees of the countries around the Mediterranean. But at a certain elevation above the sea, we meet, on the Apennines and the Greek mountains, several trees and shrubs which require a cooler climate, and these are, for the most part, the same as those which we find in Northern Europe — such as the beech, the pine, the fir, the yew, the service-tree, the birch, the bog-myrtle, the hazel, and the holly ; and when we consult Theophrastus and Pliny — especially the former — we find these mentioned as mountain-plants. As a further evidence of the unchanged condition of vegetation, we may mention, that corn, pomegranates, grapes, FUETHEE CONTEIBTJTIONS TO THE HI8TOBY OF BLA.NTS. 15 dates, and olive-branches, nave been found well preserved in Egyptian sepulchres, and that these agree with the species growing at present. Olives, which cannot be distinguished from those now growing, have also been found in Pompeii. Although the natural historians of antiquity have left us no representations, we do possess a few — namely, the paint- ings on the buildings in Pompeii and Herculaneum, in the old Roman baths, and in the caves of Elytheia, in Egypt. Notwithstanding that these pictures were not drawn with any reference to natural history, and we are therefore no more justified in drawing inferences from them than from wall-paintings of the present day, yet many of them — some very good representations of plants, which can be recognised readily — indicate again that vegetation was the same then as now ; this is particularly the case with the numerous pictures of plants which have been found in the chambers at Pompeii. If the vegetable kingdom has remained unaltered for more than 2000 years, it is in the highest degree probable that it was not subject to change long further back in historical time ; and, therefore, it is in this way also rendered exceedingly likely, though not strictly proved, that no new species of plant has originated in the historical period. If the vegetable kingdom has remained unchanged, this must have been the case with the climate also ; for climate and vegetation stand in such close connexion, that alterations of climatal conditions must necessarily bring about changes in vegetation ; a total change when the climate is greatly altered; a partial when the alterations are slighter. But there are other reasons besides, which testify to the con- stancy of the climate. The changes which the surface of the earth itself has undergone, through volcanic eruptions, elevations, earth- quakes, altered course of rivers, the action of the sea on coasts, &c, are, taken as a whole, too inconsiderable to be taken into consideration when speaking of Nature at large. We thus arrive to the remarkable conclusion, that the same Nature which surrounds us, also surrounded our Pagan forefathers thousands of years ago ; that the same Nature in which the ancient Egyptians, Greeks, and Eomans lived, also surrounds the Egyptians, Greeks, and Eomans of the present day ; that Nature (material Nature) has remained un- 16 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. changed, or been but little altered, while the human race, both as a whole and also the individual races, have under- gone such great change ; that Nature has stood still, or moved but little, while the human mind has become deve- loped to its present standing. At the same time, it is far from my intention to deny that physical Nature has gone through a development ; we have, in fact, sought to prove that the vegetable, like the animal kingdom, exhibits an historical development, in which the imperfect has first appeared, and the more complete gradually succeeded ; but this development has happened during far longer periods, and, apparently, in such a way, that the development, when it had attained a certain point, stood still, while the human mind, as a whole, has unfolded itself unceasingly, or with inconsiderable interruptions. The con- trast is lost, however, when we direct our attention to indivi- dual races, which, like Nature, have been little, or not at all, developed in the historical period — as, for example, the Austra- lians of New Holland, and the Botecudos of South America ; others remain stationary after thej r have attained a certain point, as the Hindoos and the Chinese. "When we say, however, that Nature has remained un- altered during the historical period, we mean only in so far as it has been left to itself ; for man is capable of transform- ing Nature in a certain, and not inconsiderable degree, and this the more, the higher the stage of cultivation in which be stands. But this investigation into the influence of man in transforming Nature is so comprehensive, that it certainly merits a separate consideration. THE ORIGIN OF EXISTING VEGETATION. 17 CHAPTEE III. THE ORIGIN OE EXISTING VEGETATION. The history of the earth has made gigantic steps forward in the course of the last half century. Arbitrary theories have been replaced by abundant facts, and conclusions derived from them. "We have already mentioned, that as, in human history, an older epoch is often better elucidated than a more recent, so also the more ancient periods of the history of the earth are better known than the newest ; for while we possess tolerably good knowledge of the condition of the earth, its plants and animals, in the coal period, our infor- mation is very imperfect concerning the age which formed the transition between the ancient world and that of to-day. It is only quite recently that geologists and zoologists have begun to work in this field of inquiry ; botanists have con- tributed very little to the illustration of this period. Among the most important questions in this investigation, is un- doubtedly that of the origin and diffusion of the vegetation which now clothes the earth ; and there exist certain fun- damental problems, which must be decided in the first instance. 1. It is asked, whether each species of plant first made its appearance in one place (the so-called centre), from which it subsequently became diffused over larger or smaller areas, sometimes over very extensive tracts ? or whether it may be assumed that the same species of plant originated in several, and often very widely separated spots ? — in connexion with which, again, stands the question whether it is necessary to assume one single individual (or two, when the sexes are represented in distinct plants) for each species, or whe- ther we may suppose several original individuals to have existed. "When the idea of a species is defined in this way — that it is a collection of individuals which have all descended from one individual, the idea is built upon an hypothesis ; or, in other words, that is presupposed which it is the object to prove, for no evidence is offered of a community of origin of this kind. And when we look at the facts presented by existing geographical distribution, this hypothesis becomes c 18 THE EARTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. highly improbable ; in certain cases altogether inadmissible. For, in order to bear out the idea of the common centre for each species, the means of diffusion must be demonstrated. But it will readily be perceived, that although these are fre- quently in action, they are in many eases wholly insufficient to explain the occurrence of the same species of plant in widely distant countries. These means are various : man- kind, who in their operations, convey plants from one place to another, sometimes intentionally, sometimes unintention- ally ; currents of the ocean, which carry fruits from coast to coast (the cocoa-nut) ; rivers, which float down the fruits or seeds of mountain-plants into the valleys; the winds, which disperse seeds and fruits, especially such as have a covering of hair, plumes, or the so-called wings, which facilitate the dif- fusion; and birds, which likewise may sometimes favour the pro- pagation. It may be further assumed, that in places where the geographical distribution presents difficulties, tracts of land have subsided (the Channel, the Mediterranean, &c), which formerly connected countries now divided from each other. But it is readily seen how insufficient these means are, when we reflect that many species of plants are common, on the one hand, to the Alps and the Pyrenees, on the other, to the Scandinavian and Scotch mountains, without these species being found in the plains or on the lower mountains lying between ; that the flora of Iceland is almost the same as that of the Scandinavian mountains ; that Europe and North America have many plants in common, particularly in the northern regions, which have not been transported by man ; and still further difficulties, bordering on impossibility, arise for such an explanation, when we know that species occur in the Straits of Magellan, and in the Falkland Isles, which belong to the flora of the Arctic Pole — for example, Phleum alpvnum, Erigeron alpinus ; that various European plants occur in New Holland and Van Dieman's Land, as well as in New Zealand, which are not found in the tropical coun- tries intervening, and which cannot be assumed to have been conveyed over ; this holds especially of various fresh- water plants, as of the fescue-grass, our common reed, our common frog-bit, several species of duck-weed and sedges, the bull-rush, and Aira flexuom. The accounts of those species which are common to the Arctic and Antarctic coun- THE OHIGIN OP EXISTING VEGETATION. 19 tries, are not merely derived from former times, when the species were not so strictly defined as at present, but the most recent researches, in particular those of Dr. Hooker in the South Polar Expedition, have both confirmed the old examples and added new ones to them. The number of such plants becomes still greater when we direct atten- tion to the flowerless and leafless plants (Cryptogams) ; these afford manifold examples of species which are common to the most distant regions, without occurring in the inter- mediate countries ; and yet there is no reason for assuming that these species of plants are better adapted for wandering ; on the other hand, it is quite conceivable, that the simpler organisms should more readily appear independently in dif- ferent places. Again, there is no evidence that plants which the fruits or seeds render more apt for diffusion, are more frequently common to distant places than any others. The fact, too, that the different floras of the ancient world agreed more closely together than those of the present time, affords an argument against attributing a great influence to diffusion ; for, since there was less land then, probably con- sisting only of islands, diffusion was more difficult at that time. Neither does the agreement or difference of floras at present stand in any proportion to the facility or diffi- culty of diffusion ; although the effect of this cannot be denied, for example, in the poverty which the floras exhibit in small islands distant from continents. Even in regard to those regions where nothing hinders diffusion, as between the west coast of France and the Ural, it would be strange to assume that this great tract must have remained as good as barren, until the species common all over it had completed their migration from one end of this great plain to the other, or from the middle to both ends. When the idea of one progenitor for countless individuals of any one species is maintained, it seems to be overlooked that the idea of a species can scarcely be made good of the lowest plants and animals — for example, in Lichens, Algae, and Zoophytes ; and that even among the more developed forms of plants (perhaps also of animals), the definition of the species frequently depends upon the individual views of the naturalist. It is no argument against the hypothesis of several places of origin for plants, that this can hardly be c2 20 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. demonstrated of the mammalia, that even much speaks against it ; for example, that America and the old continents have no species in common ; that no hares, moles, or squir- rels occur in Ireland ; no moles in the island of Moen (near Zealand), as well as that most of the reptiles of England are wanting in Ireland ; for, just as we have seen that the leaf- less and fiowerless plants are oftener rediscovered in distant countries, than those bearing flowers, we may assume that the more perfect animals are less prone to, perhaps never do, make their appearance in several places independently.* Perhaps the matter may be rendered clearer by a single example. Forbes, the distinguished English author who has treated this subject, and starts from the hypothesis of a single progenitor, as an axiom, endeavours to explain whence the British Islands have obtained their existing flora. The presence of a few Spanish plants f in the west of Ireland, leads him to the assumption of the existence of a great con- tinent, which not only occupied the space where the deep Spanish Sea now lies, but extended as far as the Azores, and farther into the Atlantic Ocean ; certain plants, which are com- mon to the south of France on the one side, and the south of Ireland and south-west of England on the other, made their way in, according to him, at a period when the Channel had not yet been formed ; the Alpine plants (Polar plants) (* The above statements are contrary to the views pretty generally entertained by naturalists in this country, and appear to me to contain several erroneous judgments. In the first place, as to the origin of species, it is just as hypothetical to say that a species was created in many places, as to say it had a single origin, for we have no proof of either. Secondly, if cases of transport be admitted at all, it fol- lows that it must be a matter of evidence and opinion as to what is, or has been, the possible extent ; and the defender of the single origin may fairly demand time and opportunity for far more investigation than has yet been applied, before he is called upon to explain every case of diffusion. Thirdly, Prof. Schouw himself illustrates strikingly, both in this and some other chapters, the extent to which diffusion takes place, even under our own eyes ; and therefore, when geological time is taken as an element in the question, and a gradual and successive creation of forms is admitted, there seems a fair case for arguing that all plants had single specific centres. Fourthly, the statement that species depend on opinion in the lower forms of organization, is to us an absurdity, when it is argued, a little further on, that the higher forms never change. Either species do exist through- out nature, or they do not exist at all. The mere fact of naturalists disagreeing about definition, proves nothing but the imperfection of knowledge. — Ed.) (t The above is by no means a correct account of Prof. E. Forbes's views ; in particular, no mention is made of the geological and zoological evidence on which the suppositions are principally based. — Ed.) THE OEIGIN OF EXISTING VEGETATION. 21 which the mountains of Scotland, "Westmoreland, and "Wales, share with the mountains of Scandinavia, in his opinion, made their way in from the north, at a time when the climate was as severe upon the coasts as it is now at the summits of the mountains. He believes that the diffusion was effected by icebergs, or by a great northern continent between Scot- land, Scandinavia, and Iceland, which has subsequently sub- sided. Finally, the bed of the North Sea was elevated in more recent periods, and England thus rendered continuous with Denmark and Germany; and German plants, which then made their way in, drove back the Scandinavian, on the right side, to the Scotch Highlands, while a few found a refuge in "Wales, Cumberland, and "Westmoreland, — on the left, dis- placed the southern forms of vegetation, and in this way came to occupy the greatest part of the country.* He con- siders that the Polar flora formerly came into close contact with that of the Mediterranean, which is contrary to all analogies of the present time. But if we set out from the hypothesis of several progenitors, the explanation of the conditions of the botanical geography of the British Islands is extremely simple. The west of Ireland, and the south-west of England, had then, as now, a climate unusually mild in proportion,to its latitude, especially a mild winter ; hence came into existence a portion of the plants which are also developed under the similar climate of Spain and the south of France: the Scotch and English mountains had then, as now, a Polar climate ; consequently pretty nearly the same plants were produced there as in Lap- land and on the Scandinavian mountains. The German colonization is superfluous under this hypothesis. 2. Another fundamental question is, whether new species still originate, or the creation of existing system of vegetation is completed ? It is true, as we have already mentioned, our newer lists of the plants which grow in a given country or province, or in the environs of a certain town, contain many species which do not appear in the older catalogues ; but this does not prove that they are new productions. In former times, it is well known, greater differences were requisite than at pre- * The bridge of communication once existing, we can just as well suppose that English plants made their way into Germany. 22 THE EARTH, PLANTS, AND MAS". sent to form the ground for making a species ; and when we examine the newly-added species, we find that they are usually forms which the older botanists have or would have included under other species. We frequently meet with them also in old herbaria, or in the figures of old books. Plants do un- doubtedly occur, not unfreqiiently, which were not formerly met with in the stated places ; these, however, are not cases of new species, but merely of new stations for existing species. I have endeavoured to prove, in another place,* that the plants which, according to the old Greek and Roman authors, formed the predominant characteristics of those countries especially situated on the Mediterranean, were the same which now distinguish the Mediterranean flora. The easiest way in which we can imagine the origin of new species, must be, either that an existing species assumes other characters through alterations of the climate or soil, or that accidental deviations from the normal type become constant through isolation. In this manner fixed varieties are formed, which sometimes deserve to be regarded as species ; but in cases of this kind which present themselves, the result has been brought about by the assistance of cultivation ; so far as I am aware, we have no certain facts in regard to this point from natural conditions. On the other hand, there seems to be much evidence in favour of the supposition that when the external circumstances are changed, a species vanishes rather than undergoes transformation, except in the case of those plants which appear in different forms under different con- ditions — for example, amphibious plants, or such as exhibit one form in shady spots and another when freely exposed. When peat-bogs are drained, Primula farinosa, the species of sundew, Andromeda polifolia, Soheuchzeria, &c, gradually disappear, but they are not transformed into new species. When a wood is rooted up, the wood anemone, the hepatica, the wood-sorrel, &c, vanish, but do not become new species. When lakes are laid dry, the water-lilies, the arrow-head, &c, are no longer seen, but do not undergo change of form. The phenomena when a tract, originally bare, becomes clothed with vegetation, as we have already described in some detail, also speak against the origin of new species. For when the bed of the sea is dyked in, the naked tract does not become * Brewster's Edinburgh Journal. See also above, page 14. THE OBIGIN OF EXISTING VEGETATION. 23 occupied by new species, but by the plants of the nearest coast ; it is the same when bare lava-streams become gradually overgrown by plants, or coral islands rise above the surface of the ocean, and by degrees acquire a vegetation. In the last case, apparently, in the first instance only those plants are found, the seeds of which can be conveyed by the sea ; particularly the cocoa-nut palm, the fruits of which are well fitted for transport by currents, and preservation in water. Consequently such islands, particularly when isolated, are very poor in species ; as, for example, according to Darwin's account, Keeling Island, south-west of Java ; according to Chamisso, several such islands in the South Sea. To the same cause must we ascribe it that the vegetation of extensive alluvial formations — formations which are now in constant progress, is, if not poor, extremely trivial, that is to say, with- out peculiarities. The valley of the Nile, Lombardy, and, indeed, Holland also, may be mentioned as examples. For these reasons, I hold it in the highest degree pro- bable, if not strictly proved, that no new species originate at present. • 3. A third fundamental question, which presses itself upon us, is : whether the appearance of the existing vegetation of the earth, took place at once, or oy degrees ? It appears to me, that much speaks in favour of the latter alternative. The surface of the earth only became gradually fitted, through various elevations, for the growth of plants upon it, and the characters of the soil and climate were different in different quarters of the globe ; therefore, there is the greatest probability in the assumption that such vege- tation originally made its appearance in that, or in those places where the conditions were most favourable. More- over, plants exist the conditions of whose existence depend upon other plants, and the appearance of the latter must, therefore, have preceded that of the former. Parasitical plants, as well the higher as the lower, could not exist before those plants upon which they grow were in existence. Plants flourishing in the shade — for example, the wood and forest plants of the present time — could not have made their appearance before trees existed ; nor bog-plants before the mosses and confervas which form peat-bogs. The appearance of manure-plants was equally impossible, so long as no manure 24 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. existed. The growth of vegetation upon naked cliffs com- menced with lichens and mosses,* which produced a little mould and accumulations of water, in which the seeds of other plants could germinate, and plants of greater dimen- sions, bushes and trees, gradually made their appearance. It is, therefore, altogether improbable that in the first appearance of vegetation, the majority of plants would have presented themselves before the conditions in which they live had come into existence. I must, consequently, assume a gradual creation as in the highest degree probable. 4. A fourth question: whether there exist among the plants of the present time, certain which have descended to us from, the ancient world ? can scarcely be adequately answered in the existing position of geology, for we are acquainted scarcely with one fixed limit between the present and the immediately preceding age of the world's history. To this must be added the fact, that if, as I believe, examples of existing species may be named, which have been found in older strata, this is no proof, according to what has been assumed in the fore- going, that they have survived the revolutions of nature which immediately preceded our existing period ; for if we assume that the same species can. have appeared in different places at the same time, it may also have appeared at dif- ferent times.f 5. Assuming, as I believe we must, that existing vegeta- tion appeared at different times, we might wish to know which of our existing species are the oldest, which the youngest ; we might wish to become acquainted with the different vegetable formations, just as we know the geological forma- tions. In order to arrive at a clear view of this subject, we may have recourse, in part, to the external conditions under which the different floras, or geographical vegetable systems of existing vegetation, made their appearance, and in part to the composition and the properties of those sys- tems. As a specimen, I will here first take the Alpine flora, that is, the vegetation which is found upon the Alpine svstem, above the tree-limit and below the snow-line — : a flora which * Or with succulent plants, which derive their nourishment chiefly from the watery vapour of the atmosphere. (t Neither of which are to be considered warrantable assumptions.— Ed.) THE OEIGIN OP EXISTING VEGETATION. 25 displays a high degree of peculiarity, in contrast to the Cen- tral-European flora of the plains and highlands; for this latter I will take as a type the German flora, in the sense it is understood by the Grerinan botanical authors, namely, in- cluding the Littoral, Istria, and South Tyrol ;* so that here the foot of the Alps and the lower mountains will be con- trasted with the high Alps, or Alpine region, as it is called. Looking, in the first place, at the external conditions of this flora, and in particular at what we ascertain from a geological point of view, it is well known that, according to Elie de Beaumont, the main chain of the Alps is more recent than the other mountain masses of Europe, having made its appearance in the latest considerable elevation, indeed, after, the diluvial formation; and that, in like manner, what he calls the West Alps, are of very recent origin, and, in fact, appeared subsequently to all the tertiary formations. This late date gives some probability to the idea that the vegeta- tion is of recent origin — in any case, that part of the Alpine flora which is not found elsewhere ; partly, because those mountains most recently upheaved must have been the latest to be fitted for the growth of plants, just as at present the newest lava-stream, as a rule, receives plants subsequently to the older ones ; partly, because it cannot readily be conceived where those Alpine plants, now growing between 6000 and 9000 feet, could have grown at the time when no mountains of such a height existed, or only at a distance which rendered a colonization almost impossible ; while we are unable to ex- plain the presence of many plants peculiar to the high Alps, altogether wanting in the previously upheaved Apenni n es and Pyrenees. Tet it must be admitted that no decisive proof can be sought in the more recent elevation of the Alps, so long as we are ignorant how far back existing vegetation Jived, and how far it can have survived the great revolutions which the upheaval of such gigantic mountain-chains must have caused. Another reason for attributing an inferior age to the Alpine flora is the decreasing temperature of the earth. For if the earth has gradually cooled down, the plants which flourish at * It is scarcely necessary to remark, that in other botanico-geographical re- searches this union of the flora of the Mediterranean with the German, or Central- European, flora, is altogether inadmissible. 26 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. the lowest temperature must have made their appearance last, because, at earlier periods, the climatal conditions fa- vourable to these plants did not exist. An argument against this is furnished by Agassiz's theory,* which supposes a period to have existed before the present, in which not only Switzer- land, but also France and G-ermany, lay buried under a per- manent covering of ice, such as now exists at the extreme poles. Without mentioning the numerous points which can be fairly objected to this theory, I will merely remark that many traces of trees in Northern Europe, from the newer and most recent tertiary formations, speak strongly against it ; while the abundant remains of arborescent vegetation in the oldest peat-formations and submarine forests, show that trees grew in Northern Europe in or immediately after the diluvial period, which could not have been the case if Central Europe lay buried in snow. Lastly, the fossil elephants and rhinoceroses in Siberia testify against it ; for even if it must be regarded as having been erroneously assumed, formerly, that the existence of these animals involved that of a warm climate, yet is it certain that they could not live in regions which were constantly buried beneath ice ; and if Central Europe had such a frozen climate, it must naturally have been still colder in North Europe and Northern Siberia. Thus the climatal conditions also seem to argue for the recent origin of Alpine vegetation. But it must be admitted that this does not fully complete the proof. Perhaps more important evidence might be derived from the special character of the Alpine vegetation, and this in several respects. It is abundantly proved and attested by fossil plants, that the lower plants appeared earlier than the higher ; that, consequently, the history of the earth, in respect to the plants as in respect to the animals, exhibits a progres- sive development from the simple to the compound organisms. In the oldest period (that of the coal), the flowerless plants prevailed fplantce vasculares cryptoga/mte) ; and in the middle coal periods, Conifers and Cycadaceae, which belong to the Dicotyledons devoid of a corolla (Dicotyledonece apetalce). (* The author has taken the crude, extreme terms of the glacial theory. It is not now supposed that Northern Europe had a climate like that close to the Poles ; but there is every reason to believe that it had one like the North American coast, within the line of the summer floating ice during the glacial period. — Ed.) THE OBIGIN OT EXISTING VEGETATION. 27 When these facts stand clearly before us, we are inclined to assume that a similar condition must also be traceable, al- though in a smaller degree, in the existing vegetable world ; and that, therefore, of two existing floras, that in which the higher forms most predominate must be the younger. To test whether this conjecture corresponded to the truth, I have compared the Alpine flora with the existing flora of Germany and with the flora of the ancient world, and have arrived at the following numerical proportions* : FLORA OF TUB ANCIENT WORLD. Before the After the Chalk. Chalk. Flowerless ,81 ,02 Monocotyledons ,06 ,13 Dicotyledons : Apetalous ,12 ,45 Petaliferous : ,01 ,40 EXISTING FLORA. Germany. Alps ,02 ,02 ,21 ,16 ,08 ,04 ,69 ,78 According to this, the Alpine flora has 78 per cent, of petal- iferous Dicotyledons, the German flora only 69 per cent., and the ancient world, after the chalk formation, 40 per cent., before it only 1 per cent. On the other hand, the apetalous Dicotyledons form only 4 per cent, of the Alpine flora, but 8 per cent, in the German flora (7 per cent, if we exclude sea-side plants) ; while in the ancient world, they constitute (including the Cycadeae) 12 per cent, before the chalk, and 45 per cent, after it. In regard to the flowerless plants, in which the proportions are so completely different from those of the ancient world, the quotients are alike. "We must not, however, confine our examination to the numerical propor- tions, but inquire what groups are especially predominant on, and characteristic of the Alps, and develope a multiplicity of forms there ; and in this respect it deserves to be mentioned, that the Ranunculacea?, Rosacese, Saxifragaceae, and Cruciferse, are the families which chiefly prevail and appear in peculiar forms — families which are among the most highly developed ; next to these come the Primulacese and Gentianaceae, which also must be regarded as well-developed groups. On the other hand, neither the apetalous Dicotyledons nor the * In reference to the German and Alpine floras, I hare used Koch's Hand-book ; for the ancient flora, Bronn's Catalogue, in the " Natural History of the Three Kingdoms." 1846. 28 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. Monocotyledons offer any family which plays an important part in the Alps, and still less one which presents itself in peculiar forms. The Alpine plants belonging to these groups are merely representatives of well-known German forms. If we compare in this manner the Lapland flora, or what amounts to the same thing, that of the Scandinavian mountains, with that of the remainder of the country, according to Hart- man's flora, we obtain the following numerical proportions : Scandanavia. Lapland. Flowerless 03 ,05 Monocotyledons 26 ,31 Dicotyledons : Apetalous ,08 ,09 Petaliferous ,63 ,55 Geologists assume that the mountains of Scandinavia are older than the Alps. But we find that the Lapland flora, which is at the same time that of the Scandinavian moun- tains, approaches nearer to those of the ancient world ; since the proportion of the flowerless plants is somewhat larger, that of the apetalous Dicotyledons a little larger, and that of the petaliferous Dicotyledons considerably smaller. We find, moreover, in comparing the Lapland flora, or that of the Scandinavian mountains, with that of the Alps, a greater divergence in reference to the numerical proportions between the large groups, than when we compare the Alps and Ger- many, or Scandinavia and Lapland ; nevertheless, when we regard the habitual character of the floras, as of the families, genera, and even of the species, the agreement of the Alpine and Scandinavian mountain floras is much greater than that which exists, or climatal conditions would suffer to exist, be- tween them and their corresponding lowlands. This becomes clearer when we combine the above tables : EXTINCT FLORAS. Before the After the Chalk. Chalk. Flowerless ,81 ,02 Monocotyledons ,06 ,13 Dicotyledons : Apetalous ,12 ,45 Petaliferous 01 ,40 EXISTING FLOKAS. Germany. Alps. Scand. Lap]. ,02 ,02 ,03 ,05 ,21 ,16 ,26 ,31 ,08 ,04 ,08 ,09 ,69 ,78 ,63 ,55 Another peculiarity of a part of the Alpine flora, is the remarkably indefinite condition of the species — a striking un- THE ORIGIN OF EXISTING VEGETATION. 29 certainty of form, which renders it infinitely difficult, not to say impossible, to define the species ; so that in certain forms one author assumes many, another a few species to exist. I need merely call attention to the genera, JDraba, Arabis, Hieraciim, Oentiana, and Salix. The want of definition in the forms is the more remarkable here, that the Alpine plants are multiplied more by buds than by seeds ; and the propaga- tion by buds, as is well known, preserves the character of species better than the multiplication by seeds.* If the view which I have indicated above, that the plants are not de- scended from single progenitors, but from many individuals, were correct, it might, indeed, be considered probable that species had been gradually produced by certain of the closely allied forms establishing their type by degrees, through propagation by seeds or buds, while other forms were exter- minabed by them. But if this had been the case, the older flora must have possessed more forms, and those' of greater fixedness, than the recent. Under this point of view, the production of new forms (varieties) by human agency, would be a kind of retrogression to a primitive natural condition. This conclusion, however, loses much of its force from the fact of the Scandinavian mountain flora, which must be regarded as the older, exhibiting a greater uncertainty of the forms ; so that one would be rather inclined to seek the causes thereof in the great variety of the local conditions. Although I believe that we have here fair grounds for con- sidering the Alpine flora as more recent than those of Central Europe and the Scandinavian mountains, it is by no means my intention to assume this as proved. Before we can attain to certainty in this matter, we require a quantity of elucidations of geological conditions, in which we are at pre- sent deficient ; and for the deduction of conclusions respect- ing the intimate character of the floras, evidence of the im- portance of the numerical proportions exhibited between the primary groups of the floras, as well as of their other cha- racters, must be obtained by comparison of several, or of a large number of floras. Secure acquisitions will only be ob- tained by a right earnest co-operation of botanists, geologists, and zoologists. It was my especial object to incite bota- (» It is rather the fact that propagation by buds perpetuates varieties, while seedlings tend to return to the primitive type. This is seen daily in horticultural operations — Ed) SO THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. nists to a thorough study of the geographical vegetable kingdoms, the different characters of these, and the geological and physical conditions under which they are met with. The foregoing statements must be regarded as merely tentative propositions, destined to a more minute investigation. Hence a few more indications may be added in reference to this sub- ject. It is well known that New Holland and South Africa are remarkable for a high degree of variety of forms, and thus possess great peculiarity ; while, on the other hand, the flora of extra-tropical South America is devoid both of variety and of peculiarity, approximating not a little to the floras of Europe and North America. That variety cannot have arisen from migration of the plants, for both New Holland and South Africa are but little adapted to admit this ; the former is entirely surrounded by the ocean, the latter bounded by it on three sides, and on the fourth by mountains and barren deserts. Neither can the variety be derived from the climatal conditions, for these exhibit much less variation in the southern hemisphere, on account of the greater influence of the ocean. Might not these re- markable relations of the three continents of the southern hemisphere be best explained by historical conditions ? In New Holland and South Africa, the species appear to be less definitely fixed ; and the families, also, which must be ac- counted among the more perfect, here exhibit great develop- ment and become strongly predominant, as the Acacias and Myrtacese. One more suggestion. Most of the saline plants (Halophytes) belong to the least-developed Dicotyledons, namely, to the apetalous — to the group which played a greater part in the ancient world than it does at present. May not this indicate, perhaps, that these plants belong to an older vegetable formation, which, from the fact of these plants oc- curring upon the sea-coast, would be preserved more readily during the revolutions ? Some persons, perhaps, may regard these remarks as barren, and leading to no certain results. But when we consider what paleontology" was fifty years ago, and what it is now, we cannot give up the hope of making progress in these investiga- tions. It is true there are limits to human knowledge, but we can only find what these limits are by trial. The naturalist must not be frightened by the mute Sphynx of nature. He must endeavour to compel her to speech. THE POMPEIAN PLANTS. 31 CHAPTER IV. THE POMPEIAN PLANTS. Some eighteen centuries ago, Vesuvius was not known as an active volcano ; its foot and its declivities exhibited great fertility, the summit was rather flat ; but the effect of fire was evident upon the mountain mass, and it was con- jectured to be a volcano which had lost its activity, just as we at present draw such conclusions respecting the extinct volcanoes in Auvergne, on the Rhine, or in the Alban Mountains, and several other places in Italy. During the reign of Nero, a.d. 63, a very violent earth- quake shook the neighbourhood of Vesuvius ; part of Pompeii was destroyed. Herculaneum suffered greatly ; Naples, and the other more distant cities, less. But this was only the forerunner of a far more violent revolution of nature. In the reign of Titus, a.d. 79, the naturalist Pliny, com- manding the Roman fleet, lay at Cape Misenum, to the west of Naples. One evening, his sister, the mother of the younger Pliny, called his attention to a cloud, of extraordinary size and of unusual aspect, which rose perpendicularly upwards like a column, and spread out above into a crown, so that it bore resemblance to a pine-tree. Pliny immediately caused a swift-sailing ship to be prepared, and steered in it towards Vesuvius, from which, as was soon evident, this cloud, or more correctly, this smoke, originated. The dense showers of cinders, the pumice and blocks of stone thrown out, soon made their appearance, and spread terror over the whole vicinity. The naturalist advanced fearlessly towards the danger. "Fortune favours the bold," was his encouragement to his people. He passed the night in a little villa at Stabise, and slept so peacefully that his breathing could be heard without ; he slept, until he was awakened in the morning lest he should be shut up in the house, for the fallen cinders had almost blocked up the door. At break of day, which, how- ever, was darker than night from the showers of cinders, he went out to observe and note down the phenomena. The flames and sulphurous vapours, which drove the others away, excited him. A cloth was spread upon the ground for him to 32 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. lie upon ; but he had scarcely remained a moment on it, when, attempting to rise, with the assistance of his two slaves, he suddenly fell down dead, probably suffocated. In this violent eruption of Vesuvius, the first noticed in history, the cities of Pompeii, Herculaneum, and Stabise, were destroyed ; Pompeii and Stabire by showers of cinders, Herculaneum by a stream of lava. These cities lay buried for 1600 or 1700 years after that time, and even their exact position was unknown when accident led to their discovery, towards the close of the seventeenth and the commencement of the eighteenth century. At present, they are in great part laid open — Pompeii in particular — the ashes having been removed ; we ramble over the market-place, through the streets, temples, theatres, and private dwellings, as in a city of the present day ; we make acquaintance with the arrangements of the homes of the ancients, their furniture, their cooking utensils, the ornaments of the ladies, the tools and workshops of their artisans, and their, in some instances, excellent works of art ; and here we obtain, better than in any other place, an immediate con- ception of the public and private life of antiquity. An acquaintance with the plants known to the Pompeians may, perhaps, possess some interest ; and for this, two prin- cipal sources present themselves — namely, the pictures and other representations of plants found in Pompeii, and other buried cities, and the actual remains of plants. Some circum- spection is necessary in the use of the first means. Of course, many representations of plants are so indistinguishable that they cannot be determined, as would also be the case in the present day. Even when the plant is distinguishable, it is not made out that it occurred in Pompeii ; for the vegetation of foreign lands was frequently depicted. Thus we often find the Nile scenery represented — marshy regions, with the lotus and the Egyptian bean (Nelumbium), the hippopotamus, the crocodile, the ichneumon and ducks, with the date-palm upon the shores ; for example, in the lower compartment of the cele- brated Mosaic, which is supposed to represent Alexander and Darius. The representations are frequently fancy-pictures ; for instance, a laurel-tree, out of which grows a date-palm — nay, even springs from it as a root-sucker — a physiological impossibility ; perhaps, as Tenore thinks, this indicates the strange custom which the ancients had of placing plants, the THE POMPEIAN PLANTS. 33 most diverse from each other, so close together that they looked as if they were all one. Among the trees which especially contribute to give cha- racter to the landscape in Italy, are the stone-pine and the cypress. Both occurred with the ancients, of which the authors and the pictures in Pompeii bear testimony, for re- presentations of the pine-cones have been many times met with. In like manner carbonized seeds of the stone-pine have been found in Herculaneum. The cypress is very frequently found in the landscapes which decorate the walls of the chambers in Pompeii, and sometimes in combination with the stone-pine. A third conifer peculiar to the countries of the Mediterranean, the Aleppo pine, is also met with in Pompeii. The oleander, which now ornaments the banks of the rivers, and the ivy, which clothes walls and trunks of trees, are both represented in Pompeii. On the other hand, there are two plants which at present play an important part in the landscape, but did not grow in Italy in ancient times. The aloe, as it is called (more cor- rectly, the agave), which has become such a favourite with landscape painters, on account of its large, fleshy leaves, and tall candelabrum-like flowering stem, and which occurs around the Mediterranean, both cultivated and run wild, was derived from America, and therefore could not be known to the Pom- peians. The Indian fig, belonging to the cactus group, re- markable for its peculiar aspect, especially through the flat- tened leaf-like shoots, a plant which occurs now as universally as the aloe in the countries of the Mediterranean, and is in like manner found in a wild state, also came from America. And there is just as little trace, in Pompeii, of a representa- tion of this very peculiar plant, as of the aloe. It is doubtful whether isolated trees of the date-palm, with- out ripe fruit, occurred in Italy of old, as they do at present. We, indeed, frequently see them represented in Pompeii, but generally in combination with Egyptian objects, or used in a symbolical signification. But the dwarf-palm undoubt- edly played the same part then as now, since Theophrastus reports that it was very general in Sicily ; this is the case at present, while it is only sparingly met with in the Bay of Naples. 34 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAK. Turning our attention to the cultivated plants, we find that most travellers who visit Pompeii first make acquaintance there with the cultivation of cotton. Close upon the ruins of Pompeii occur cotton-fields, and the northern limit of the cotton-plant in Italy lies there. "We find no trace of this important clothing plant in the memorials of antiquity ; we know from other sources, that it was only known to the ancients as an Indian, and, according to the later authors, also as an Egyptian plant, and the Arabs first diffused it through the Mediterranean countries. Another vegetable which at present is indirectly import- ant for clothing in Italy, namely, for the food of the silk- worm, is the white mulberry. This also was unknown to the Pompeians. In their time, silk was a foreign article of luxury, regarded as of the highest value. The cultivation of silk and the mulberry came first into Europe in the sixth century. "Wheat was the prevailing grain with the ancient Romans ; barley was also general ; but they were without the more northern kinds of corn, oats and rye. Charred wheat and barley grains are found in Pompeii. There exists upon a wall a fine painting of a quail picking the grains out of a spike of barley. A side-piece to this represents a quail pecking at a spike of millet {Panicum italicwni), which, therefore, was in like manner known at that time. On the other hand, we miss drawings of the maize, a grain of such distinctly marked form ; but we know that we owe this to America. At the present time it is cultivated in the vicinity of Pompeii. Neither do we meet with rice ; it was then confined to the East Indies. It is not cultivated even now near Pompeii, but to a great extent in other parts of Italy. It is doubtful whether the "durra" (Sorghum) was known to the ancients, or was first brought into Europe by the Arabs ; the Pompeian pictures give no information on this head. Among the leguminous fruits, wc meet with the broad beans in a charred condition, perfectly resembling those of the present time. In paintings representing culinary articles, Ave find repre- sented a bundle of asparagus, which, however, is probably the wild, eaten then as it is now ; for it does not appear that the THE P0MPE1AN PLANTS. 35 ancients were acquainted with cultivated asparagus. In other pictures of culinary subjects, occur onions, radishes, turnips, and a kind of small gourd. Among the culinary vegetables un- known to the ancients, were the Pomi d'oro (Lycospersicum esculentum),'m\ivi\i have since been introduced from America. The olive appears to have played the same important part in the time of the Pompeians as it does at present ; the writers also testify to this. Olive-branches are frequently found re- presented, and a glass has been dug up in Pompeii containing preserved olives, which agreed perfectly with those of to-day, and still retained their flavour when first dug up. The fruits which are most eaten at the present time are grapes and figs ; and these are what we find most fre- quently depicted in the many fruit-pieces which occur on the Avails in Pompeii. The vine also played an important part, from being dedicated to Bacchus, and we meet with it in many pictures in connexion with the worship of this deity. Pruit and animal pieces also frequently present pears, apples, cherries, almonds, plums, peaches, pomegranates, and medlars. Some have thought that they found the pine-apple repre- sented in Pompeii ; if this were true, it would be very remark- able, since this fruit is regarded as American. But the object which has been taken for a pine-apple, and which is placed upon a dish, is what Tenore undoubtedly more correctly supposed, namely, the terminal bud of a young dwarf-palm, which is also eaten in Sicily at the present day. A much more important deficiency among cultivated plants is that of the common and Seville oranges, the lemon, and the citron. It is made out beyond doubt that some of these were known in the time of Pliny ; he states that attempts had been made in vain to introduce the Medic apple (the citron) into Europe. The culture of this in Italy commenced in the third century ; the lemon and the Seville orange came later into Europe — probably through the Arabs ; while the common orange, which is derived from China, and was brought by the Portuguese to Europe, was the last. We see, therefore, that the vegetable kingdom, and espe- cially the cultivated plants, have undergone several modifica- tions since the time when Pompeii flourished ; and that while the ancient Pompeians were so much better off than the d2 36 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. modems in regard to the enjoyments of life, in particular the pleasures of art, they nevertheless were -without certain im- portant plants, which extended geographical knowledge and expanded commerce have procured for their successors. The most important among the newly -introduced products are : rice, maize, cotton, silk, and the orange tribe. So that in those days Italy was not The land where the lemon-tree blows, And in darker leaves bowered the gold orange glows. BAIN. 37 CHAPTEE V. EAIN. Wateb poured into an open vessel is found to diminish in quantity in the course of a certain time, and after longer period, to have disappeared altogether ; we then say that the water has evaporated, knowing very well that it has only changed its form, and has ascended into the air as vapour. Evaporation is favoured by heat ; warm water in a saucer becomes diminished more quickly than cold ; the little pud- dles on a road dry up much more rapidly on a warm summer's day than on a cold day in whiter. But the ascending watery vapour is not always visible ; whether it be so or not depends upon the difference that exists between the temperatures of the evaporating body and the surrounding air. If a saucer of warm water is brought into a cold or only moderately warm room, the vapours become visible ; but we do not see them when the air of the chamber is heated to the same degree of temperature as the water. In frosty weather, the evaporation from human beings and animals becomes visible ; m warm weather it is not so, although in this case it is more considerable. When the lower stratum of the atmosphere becomes cooled down in the evening after a warm day of summer, the lakes and fields become covered with a steamy mist, that is to say, we see the ascending watery vapours, which are invisible during the day notwithstanding the greater evaporation. When the air over the sea is colder than the water, a sea-fog is produced. When the watery vapours floating in the atmosphere are visible, we call them mist or clouds. AH the difference between these two kinds of accumulation of vapour, depends upon their elevation above the earth's surface. In warm summer days, the morning mist frequently rises to a height, and becomes a cloud ; and the mass of vapour upon a moun- tain, which from the valley looks like a cloud, is found on entering into it to be exactly like a mist. But when neither cloud nor mist are to be distinguished, even in the clearest weather, watery vapour exists in the atmosphere, as can readily be proved by causing it to cool down. When cold 38 THE EARTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. water is poured into a bottle on a warm day, this becomes dulled, that is to say, vapours are precipitated upon the out- side of it, and these may even amount to drops ; these vapours can clearly have been derived from nowhere else than the atmosphere, and thus they demonstrate that the air contains vapours, even when they are invisible. The same explanation applies to dew, which is simply the watery vapour which becomes visible through the nocturnal cooling of the lower strata of the atmosphere, and of the plants or other objects which exist in them. The conversion of the vapour into the form of drops, is caused by cooling, just in the same way. When strata of air of different temperatures are mingled, or come in contact, the vapours of the warm stratum change into drops, and fall to the earth as rain. The surface of the earth with its plants and animals, on the one hand, and the atmosphere on the other, form a kind of distillation apparatus. Watery vapours rise unceasingly from oceans, lakes, rivers, morasses, plants, and animals ; they accumulate into clouds in the air, subsequently become transformed into drops, and descend again to the surface of the earth as rain. On dry land the water penetrates into the earth, and comes to light again in springs, which collect into running streams ; these give off vapour to a certain ex- tent, and empty themselves into the ocean, whence the water is again evaporated ; besides this, water is taken up by plants and animals, which likewise give off watery vapours to the atmosphere. In this way a continual circulation of water is kept up between the earth's surface and the atmosphere. The amount of rain at any given place is calculated by means of a rain-guage. This is an open vessel of known dia- meter, exposed to the air so as to catch the rain-water ; after every time it rains, the quantity which has fallen is noted, and these single quantities are added together to give the monthly and yearly amount of rain ; a mean quantity is cal- culated from the measurements of several years. The quan- tity of ram is most simply given in vertical height ; that is, by indicating the depth of water which would lie upon the ground at the end of the year or month, did not the rain- water evaporate or sink into the earth. The annual quantity of rain in Copenhagen, as stated in this way, amounts to about twenty-two inches. BAIN. 39 Should we ask what natural circumstances exert especial influence over the quantity of rain, and in consequence upon the distribution of ram over the various parts of the earth's surface, experience tells us, in the first place, that under otherwise equal circumstances, it rains more near the sea than at a distance from it. The causes of this are readily per- ceived: in the first place, the sea sends up more watery vapour than the land ; and in the second place, there is a greater alternation of temperature between the land and the sea, and, consequently, more frequent changes of the wind, than is the case between two portions of a continent where there are plains. Thus it rains more upon the British Islands, in Holland and on the north-west coast of Prance, than in Denmark or the north German plains ; and again, more here than upon the plains of Poland or Prussia. Another principal cause of the increased quantity of rain lies in the inequalities of the earth's surface. Mountains increase the amount of rain ; it increases in proportion as we approach towards them, and the higher and steeper they are. The reason is obvious here also : the strata of air over the mountains are colder than those over the plains, and a constant reaction takes place between these different strata. Sometimes the warm air of the plain rises up the sides of the mountains or through the valleys, sometimes the masses of cold air flow down from the mountains into the plains ; these strata, possessing different temperatures, meet above and below ; cooling is thus caused, and the vapours are precipi- tated as rain. "When we inquire into the amounts of raiii upon the great plain which is bounded on the north by the Alps, and toward the south by the Apennines, we find that they increase towards the Alps. Southward of the Po, the annual amount of rain amounts on an average to twenty-six inches ; northward of the river, to thirty-eight inches ; imme- diately at the foot of the Alps, to sixty inches. There are particular places in the southern part of the plain where the quantity of rain amounts only to twenty-one inches, and iso- lated points in the Alps where it amounts to a hundred inches. We meet with similar conditions when we follow the Bhine or the Phone upwards, or when we compare the quantities of rain in the mountains of Grermany and Prance with those presented by the plains. 40 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. The influence of mountain-chains in the increase of rain is greater than that of the ocean ; where, however, a range sinks down precipitously towards the sea, the increase of the rain is especially striking. The west and east sides of Scandinavia exhibit an example of this kind. The city of Bergen, the rains of which have become proverbial, has an annual amount of eighty-two inches ; in Stockholm the quantity is only twenty-one, in Upsala eighteen inches. The mountains on the west side of England have almost twice as much rain as the more level east side ; in the former the amount of rain in par- ticular spots reaches above sixty inches, while in the latter it falls in certain places to seventeen or eighteen inches. The quantity of rain on the south side of the northern Apennines, which extend close down to the Mediterranean, is very consi- derable, and in particular places rises to a hundred inches. The relation of the various winds to the rain is just as simply and readily explained. In Denmark, and generally speaking in most parts of Northern Europe, the west and south-west winds bring the rain, particularly when they alternate with north and east winds. These winds come from the ocean, which gives abundance of vapour, or from warmer countries where the evaporation is more considerable. When these currents of air, loaded with vapours, come in contact with the cold winds of the east and north, the vapour is converted into rain. In Copenhagen it rarely rains with any other wind than west or south-west ; when the reverse occurs, it is soon after a change of the wind, and then we have a right to suppose that the vapours precipitated by the north or east winds, having been previously carried over by currents of air from the west and south, are afterwards brought back. When the east or the north wind has blown for a longer time, it does not rain until a change of wind occurs. In Prussia the north wind sometimes brings rain, since this comes from the Baltic ; the south wind less fre- quently, because it comes from the dry continent. In North America the east wind is the principal source of rain ; it comes from the Atlantic Ocean. In order to comprehend the conditions of the rain of a country or any given place, it does not suffice to know how much rain falls annually ; we must also know how this quan- tity is distributed through the seasons. It of course makes RAIN. 41 a great difference whether the same quantity of rain is dis- tributed pretty equally through the seasons, or is accumulated into one season — the rainy season, in contrast to the remainder of the year, the dry season. The frequency of the repetition of the rain is another im- portant point in the examination of the condition of the rains of a region ; for it mates a great difference in the elimate whether the same amount of rain falls in many small showers or a few great rain-storms. The twenty-five inches of rain of Dublin are distributed over 208 rainy days, the twenty-two inches of Copenhagen over 134 rainy days. It might be interesting to know the distribution of rain upon the surface of the whole globe, and to obtain a resume of these conditions by a general rain-map ; but the materials for this are too few and too much scattered. We shall there- fore confine ourselves here to a part of the earth's surface — namely, Africa and Europe, from the equator to 60° N. L. In this space we meet. with the following four zones, differ- ing from each other in the conditions of their rains : 1. The Zone of the Summer Rains, from the equator to the 15° N. L. — Here, as almost everywhere in the countries within the tropics, the rain is limited to a particular season, and this at the time during which the sun stands over the northern hemisphere, and we, consequently, have summer. The amount of rain under these circumstances is very large, and, generally speaking, much more considerable than in the temperate zones. The rivers become swollen, overflow, and flood large tracts of country ; the lakes become greatly en- larged, of which Lake Tschad, in the interior of Africa, affords an example. The rain-storms are much more violent than in the temperate climates.* The regularity of the rain is not confined solely to the annual distribution ; it exists even in reference to the daily course. In the morning the air is clear ; after a time the clouds begin to collect, and about ten or eleven o'clock it begins to rain. The rain continues through the afternoon ; at sunset the atmosphere is again serene, and remains so through the night. This is repeated almost daily in the rainy season, with such regu- * Cayenne, in South America, has given an instance of as much rain falling in half a day as, on the average, falls in half a year in Copenhagen. 42 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. larity, that in arranging parties of pleasure, people settle whether they are to be before or after the rain. The rainy season does not occur simultaneously in the whole of the hot zone, but follows the sun as he recedes towards the north, so that it happens earlier at the equator than at a distance from it. The limit of this zone can be traced from west to east, from Senegal to Nubia; it lies between the 15° and 17° N. L. 2. The Rainless Zone, the Desert Zone, between 15° and 30° N. L. (N. Africa). — This is without rain the whole year, or only displays accidental rain-storms extremely rarely. Rain is one of the greatest rarities in Upper Egypt, Nubia, and Dongola. According to Pocock, it occurred only twice in eight years. The same is true, according to Euppell, of Cordofan and the north of Sennaar ; in like manner of Eezzan, between Bornou and the Mediterranean, where, ac- cording to Denham and Clapperton, five or six years may pass by without rain, as is also the case on the Desert of Sahara. Thus, this zone well deserves the name of the rainless. 3. The Zone of the Winter Sains, North Africa and the South of Europe, between 30° and 45° N. L. — The amount of rain in this zone increases towards the north ; it is very small in Lower Egypt, small in the Barka plateau, and more or less so throughout the North African coast ; towards the north, in Italy it increases considerably, and becomes especially large on the south side of the Northern Apennines. It is high in Portugal, but only low on the plateau of Spain, as on elevated plains generally. The rains of this zone are either wholly restricted to the winter, as is the case in North Africa and the Canary Islands, or they also fall, but very sparingly, during the summer, as occurs in the South of Europe ; but as we advance towards the north, the summer rains become more frequent, and the transition in this respect is gradual. Thus, the proportion of the summer rain to the whole annual amount in Sicily is only 36, in Eome 11, in Florence 14, out of 100. 4. The Zone of the Constant Rains, that is, of rains (includ- ing snow) in all seasons. — Ordinarily, the quantities of rain of the seasons do not deviate considerably from one another, EAIN. 43 yet the summer and autunm rains are more abundant than those of the winter and spring. In the neighbourhood of the Atlantic Ocean, the autumn brings most rain ; in the interior of the Continent, the summer. The distribution of rains here described is founded upon observation, and therefore must be regarded as a fact, while the explanation of their conditions remains more or less uncertain. The conditions of rains which are met with within the tropics, namely, the separation into a dry and a rainy season, are explained by Humboldt — apparently happily — in the following way : When the sun stands over the southern hemisphere (i. e., when we have winter), there exists a great difference of temperature between the torrid and the northern temperate zone, between Africa up to some 20° on the one side, and North Africa and Europe on the other. This difference of temperature causes a strong influx of colder air towards the equator, and in the same manner as an influx of this kind takes place from the ocean on to a strongly heated continent, or, on a small scale, when the door is opened of a room, where the air is at a higher temperature than without ; the colder air thus flowing in becomes warmed, and rises upwards in the torrid zone ; and so long as that condition lasts, so long as the influx and ascent are not interfered with, the vapours in the air cannot fall as rain in the torrid zone itself. But when the sun stands over our hemisphere (i. e., when we have summer), the air also becomes warmed over the temperate zone, and then there is not so great a dis- tinction between the two zones ; the influx decreases, and becomes, at the same time, less regular ; calms and variable winds ensue — and then the vapours find the conditions in which they are precipitated as rain. And since the evapora- tion is very powerful in the torrid zone, so the amount of vapour is large, and consequently that of the rain. The considerable amounts of vapour which ascend into the higher strata of the atmosphere, flow towards the north, to restore equilibrium ; they cannot reach the lower strata of air in those parts of the temperature adjacent to the torrid zone, in which the influx takes place ; this occurs in a higher latitude. Consequently, we find next to the zone of the ascending vapours, a zone of influx ; and to the north of this, 44 THE EARTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. a zone where the vapours fall down upon the surface of the earth. But these zones change with the sun, just like the zone of the summer rains. When the sun stands above the southern hemisphere (when we have winter), and the rainy season prevails to the south of the equator, there is in the northern hemisphere, about to the 15° N. L., a strong elevation of temperature and ascent of vapours, and no rain ; between 15° — 30°, a power- ful current toward the equator (prevailing north and north- east winds) , and in like manner no rain ; but beyond 33° north the vapours fall, and thus the North of Africa and South Europe obtain their winter rains.* During the summer, on the other hand, when the sun is over the northern hemisphere, the rainy season occurs be- tween the equator and 15° N. L. ; the vapours rise between 15° — 30° (from the Desert but little, but so much the more from the Atlantic Ocean) ; the zone of influx is changed to 30° — 45°, whence the north wind becomes prevalent over the Mediterranean and the countries surrounding it ; and the rain does not fall until beyond 45° in Northern Europe. "We compared the evaporation and the rains with distil- lation. We have here a distillation on a vast scale ; the re- tort from which the vapours arise lies in Africa, the receiver into which they flow is Europe ; but the apparatus is moved about, so that the retort lies in winter in South Africa, the receiver in South Europe (probably also in North Europe) ; while in summer the retort is in North Africa, and the re- ceiver in North Europe. * See Von Buch's Physical Description of the Canary Islands. THE ITALIAN MALAEIA. 45 CHAPTEE VI. THE ITALIAN MALAEIA. The climate of the beautiful land which, iu the words of the poet, is embraced by the sea and the Alps, and parted by the Apennines, the pure, clear air, the mild winter, the warm and yet not scorching summer, the steady weather, make so strong an impression upon us, whether our knowledge of them be derived from our own experience or the report of others, that we often forget that this very climate, deservedly so highly praised, brings death and destruction to mankind in certain places, at particular periods of the year. As the great cities and the most frequented roads are generally far removed from such regions, a wrong idea is frequently con- ceived of the extent of the public calamities resulting from the malaria, as it is called, and one is sometimes tempted to regard as local that which is actually widely spread, thereby be- coming very liable to fall into error in judging of the causes of the malaria. This is especially true, not unfrequently, of the opinions which have been formed respecting the Roman Cam- pagna, where the unhealthy air, or narratives relating to it, fall within the sphere of experience of almost every traveller, while most of the other unhealthy regions remain unknown, or are only hastily traversed at a healthy season of the year. A description of the geographical distribution of the mala- ria, of the places and times of its occurrence, will doubtless best lead to a knowledge of its nature and causes. First of all, in reference to the distribution, it must be mentioned that the unhealthy air is naturally met with prin- cipally upon the coasts. But a closer examination shows that the vicinity of the sea is neither an exclusive condition of the unhealthy atmosphere, nor always produces it ; for we find both that unhealthy air extends, in not a few places, from the coasts into the plains and valleys of the inland regions, and indeed occurs in parts altogether unconnected with the malaria of the coast-regions ; and, on the other hand, that not a few regions of the sea-coast are protected from this ill. Thus, the Genoese coast, from Nice to the gulf of Spezia, where the Apennines extend to the sea, is free from the malaria ; but southwards, as far as Leghorn, where the moun- 46 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. tain-chain is indeed steep, but where a flat, marshy tract of coast intervenes between it and the sea, the malaria occurs. Near Leghorn, and on the rows of hills lying to the south of it, the air is again healthy, but these are succeeded by the extensive Tuscan and Roman Maremme, abundantly notorious for their baneful atmosphere, and this zone passes immedi- ately into the no less notorious Pontine Marshes. Somewhat further to the south, by the bay of Graeta, where the moun- tains come close down to the sea, the air again becomes healthy ; the succeeding tract of coast as far as the gulf of Baia is unhealthy, even as far as the grotto of Posilippo, near the bay of Naples. AH the neighbourhood of the bay of Naples, on the contrary, is healthy. In the southern part of the gulf of Salerno we again come upon the noxious atmosphere, on the extensive coast-plains of the ruins of Psestum ; while a great portion of the Calabrian coast, where the mountains lie upon the sea, is healthy again ; though we meet with the malaria once more in the environs of the gulf of Eufemia. Following the coast of the Adriatic sea, we can find similar alternations, only here the greatest portion of the coast is unhealthy ; among the exceptions, Monte G-argano is especially noticed, rising as a steep, isolated promontory out of the sea. Sicily exhibits similar conditions. Consequently, we may fairly conclude that the malaria ap- pears principally in places where a flat tract of coast lies between the sea and the mountains. But this is not univer- sally the case ; the bay of Naples and the environs of Leg- horn afford us examples of the contrary. It has been remarked above, that the malaria passes, in certain places, from the coast into the plains and valleys. With regard to the plains, it is seen that this is the case in a high degree, and to a considerable extent, with the perfectly flat plain of Puglia ; also with the Soman Campagna, which has an undulating surface ; with the plain of Pactum, that of Catania, southward of Etna, &c. In regard to the valleys, the Cesina and Ombrone valleys in Tuscany, and the Diano valley in Calabria, may be expressly named. Observation of the circumstance that the malaria makes its appearance principally upon level coasts, low plains, and deep valleys, leads us to regard the altitude as an important factor in the investigation of the conditions which produce the THE ITALIAN MALAEIA. 47 malaria. The influence of this is extremely striking. In the mountain-ridge which runs parallel with the Pontine Marshes, where the air is infected, the malaria is not met with ; whence a number of towns are seen here, while these are wanting in the plain. Refuge is taken in the Alban and Sabine mountains, during the warmest summer months, from the fevers of Rome. Above, on the Circeian promontory, the air is healthy ; so it is, also, by the ruins of Theodoric's Palace, near Terracina ; while it is noxious to the foot of each of these mountains. At Civita Vecchia the air is unhealthy ; on the more elevated Tolfa it is good. Lago di Bolsena has the malaria ; Montefiascone, on a neighbouring hill, has it not. Sometimes, however, especially in the Tuscan Maremme, the malaria ascends higher up, and it is even met with on the banks of the Lago di Perugia, 800 feet above the sea ; it formerly occurred at the same height in the Val di Chiani, namely, before the river obtained an outlet. The most ele- vated place for the malaria known to me in Italy, is the mountain-lake, Lago Pucino, 2000 feet above the sea — a lake without an outlet (since Nero's Canal, which formed an outlet for the water into the river Liri, is choked up), consequently sometimes overflowing its banks, which, after the water has retreated, emit noxious vapours. Looking next at the character of the soil, it is evident that the malaria occurs principally near morasses and stagnant lakes, and on rivers which have not a sufficient fall, or arc prevented by dunes from running out into the sea. Thus we find it in the Pontine Marshes, the marshes near Viareggio, the morasses of Lentini southward of Etna, the Lagunes near Venice and Comacchio, the lowest part of the course of the Po where it divides into a number of branches ; the rice- fields, with their stagnant water, in the valley of the Po ; the morasses of Mantua, and the northern part of Lake Como, where the river Adda runs out. On the other hand, it cannot be denied that there are many regions where neither morasses nor other stagnant waters of any importance exist, and where, nevertheless, the malaria is very prevalent ; we may name the Roman Campagna and the plain of Psestum, where, indeed, a good deal of water accumulates in winter, which, in parts, cannot readily run off, but they are dry during the rainless summer ; and this is still more true of the plain of Puglia, 48 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND HAN. which is completely dried up in summer, and is extremely deficient in springs and water, whence it was called by Horace " siticulosa." Coming to the question of the seasons, we find that the malaria prevails only in the warmest summer months. The period is longer or shorter according as the malaria of the region is stronger or weaker. June, July, August, and Sep- tember are generally the most dangerous months. Since, therefore, in Italy, southward of the Apennines, these months are either rainless or have but little wet except in September, in which the rainy season commences, the malaria principally presents itself in the dry season, and ceases with the rainy season ; yet it appears rather to increase just after the com- mencement of the rainy season, before the air has become cooled down. The time of day must be considered as well as the season. It is universally recognised that the night is the most dan- gerous time ; so that going out into the open air, or, more particularly, sleeping in it, is pretty certain to bring on an attack of the fever. The critical epochs are properly when dew is falling, therefore, at sunset and sunrise. It is, conse- quently, considered safest to remain within doors at these times, while it is regarded as less hazardous to be in the open air in the evening after sunset. "We will now proceed to the difficult and still imperfectly understood question of the causes of the malaria. There are some who think that the cause of this evil is to be sought solely in the alternations of temperature, and in the colds caught thereby ; and that when these are avoided by use of woollen clothes next the skin, and other means, the fever and the subsequent affections arising out of it, may be avoided. This opinion could scarcely merit acceptance. There are many regions where the alternations of tempe- rature are greater than they are in those infested by the ma- laria. It is well known that the diurnal warming and noc- turnal cooling are greater, the alternation of temperature, therefore, more considerable, in the interior of countries than on the coasts, as also that the sea-breezes prevailing here by day contribute to equalize the temperature. But the ma- laria occurs especially on these very coasts. Stress is laid generally upon the considerable alternations of temperature THE ITALIAN MALARIA. 49 to which Eome and the Eoman Campagna are exposed. It is true that they are greater here upon the extensive plains than immediately upon the sea, but they are smaller than in Turin, Milan, and Bologna, on the great plain of Lom- bardy, smaller than at Florence, in the broad, enclosed valley of the Amo, and yet all these places are healthy. That the danger can be kept at a distance by protecting oneself from catching cold, only shows that the body may have a different degree of susceptibility to the influence of the malaria. The monks of the orders which wear woollen garments, suffer like others from the malaria. Others seek the cause in the volcanic character of the soil. They imagine that gases of various kinds rise out of the earth, and infest the atmosphere ; these may be carbonic acid, sulphuretted hydrogen, or other kinds of gases. But well- grounded objections can be opposed to this view, which has many supporters. It is true that the earth is volcanic at Puz- zuoli, in the Eoman Campagna, and in the Tuscan and Eoman Maremme. It is likewise certain that gases injurious to hu- man beings are emitted in not a few places, though these are of limited extent, within these regions ; thus in the Tuscan Maremme, near Volterra (le Moje di Volterra), near the Lagoni di Monte Cerboli, as they are called, where boracic acid is emitted from the ground, in combination with sul- phuretted hydrogen, in many parts of the Campagna, &c. But, on the other hand, it is just as certain, that in many of the unhealthy coast tracts, and especially upon the great Puglian plain, not the slightest trace of volcanic phenomena or emissions of gas exist. Moreover, the air is healthy upon Vesuvius and Etna, which are active volcanoes, on Ischia and the Euganean hills, and other places, where the volcanic character still shows itself in warm springs and emissions of vapours and gases. In that portion of the valley of the Tiber which runs parallel with the Apennines, the soil is volcanic on the western, calcareous on the eastern side, but the air is noxious on both sides. If the malaria were produced by emissions of poisonous air, animals also must be exposed to its injurious effects ; we know that a very small quantity of sulphuretted hydrogen will kill a dog. But we find in the unhealthy E 50 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. regions wild swine and buffaloes, also sheep and goats, horned cattle, and horses. It is true, the tame animals are gene- rally driven to more elevated regions during the unhealthy- season, as from Puglia and the Roman Campagna ; but this is done because the herbage becomes dried up there, and not because the atmosphere is hurtful to the animals ; in many places there is no such change. Finally, it is not evident why the unhealthy air should be connected with a particu- lar season of the year, if it were caused by subterranean emissions. A third and at the same time the oldest opinion is, that the unhealthy atmosphere arises from the decomposition of animal and vegetable substances, which occurs when a considerable temperature acts upon stagnant or slowly-flowing water. It appears that this assumption is capable of affording an expla- nation of most of the phenomena. The Pontine marshes abound in water ; the marshes near Viareggio, the Lentinian morasses, the country round the outlet of the Ombrone and Cesina, the lagunes of the Adriatic Sea, the embouchure of the Po, the Mantuan morasses, and the rice-fields in the valley of the Po, all offer examples of unhealthy atmosphere. The places of greater elevation, where the malaria shows itself, have like- wise stagnant water ; as the lakes of Perugia, of Bolsena, and Fucino. It is an old experience, that the noxious air arises on the coasts in those places particularly where the fresh and salt waters become intermingled, which is the case when the rivers or lakes have but a slight fall, so that the sea pene- trates in at high water. It is also readily perceived, that the animals and plants of the fresh water are liable to destruction by sea-water, and, vice versa, the marine animals and plants by fresh water ; and that in this way a quantity of decaying organic matter becomes accumulated. The beneficial influence exhi- bited by drainage, and other measures preventing this mixture of fresh and salt-water, of which we shall speak presently, affords an argument in favour of this view. It is further supported by the circumstance that the unhealthy atmosphere is connected with that season in which a high temperature favours decomposition. At the same time it cannot be denied that several pheno- mena are scarcely to be explained by the cause in question ; THE ITALIAN MALARIA. 51 among others, the fact of the malaria presenting itself in the Roman Campagna, and especially the great Puglian plain, which are dry during the summer. Explanation of this by the aid of currents of air bringing the malaria of the Pontine marshes into the Campagna, and that of the Adriatic coasts to Puglia, will hardly solve the problem ; for under this point of view, the same should be the case in several regions ; for example, in the large, fertile, densely-populated plain about Naples, which likewise has the malaria in its neighbourhood. It will be better explained in the following way: that in these plains the noxious vapours do not rise until the pools of water are quite dried up, and the heat comes to act upon the organic bodies which He at the bottom of them. It is ascertained by experience, that noxious air is produced in warm regions by artificially drying up the lakes. That the effects of the malaria increase after the first rains have fallen, is a confirmation of this explanation, since the organic bodies become more liable to decomposition when they are softened by the rain. However, I by no means intend to assert that the last- mentioned cause is the only one ; for from what has already been stated, it is not improbable that sulphuretted hydrogen does play an important part in many places (for example, about Volterra) ; but at all events, the decay of organic matters seems to be the most general cause. Nevertheless, by saying that decaying organic matters diffuse unhealthy vapours in the atmosphere, and calling them miasmata, we get no complete or clear conception of the matter. Hitherto it has been vainly sought to lay hands upon these miasmata, as they are called. The distinguished Italian naturalist, Brocchi, had the courage to remain for four nights, in the month of September, near the church of St. Lorenzo fuori le mura, outside Rome, one of the most un- healthy places, which is forsaken at this season by the priests, while the country people living around are accustomed to go in at night to the public squares of Eome, to avoid the malaria in their dwellings. Brocchi collected the dew, by placing ice in glasseB so as to cool down the air. In this way he obtained two pounds of water ; but chemical analysis gave him no extraordinary results. A young, strong man, whom he had taken with him was seized with violent fever e 2 52 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. the first night, and after the experiment was completed, he himself, as he says, became abundantly aware what a foe the fever is. With regard to the effects of the malaria upon man, the first is cold fever, but this passes readily and frequently into a more malignant form. The liver and the spleen also be- come affected. Those who are compelled to remain for a length of time in the unhealthy regions, are exposed to many effects destructive to health. These effects are seen in their pale, yellow faces, sunken features, dull eyes, swollen abdo- mens, and slouching gait. They form a striking contrast to the healthy, strong, active, light-hearted beings who frequently dwell but a few miles away. It is probably to be chiefly attributed to the malaria, that in the otherwise fortunate and prosperous population of Tuscany, the mortality is greater and the duration of life shorter than in Denmark. In Tuscany, one in thirty-four or thirty-five dies annually; in Denmark, one in forty or forty- one. The average duration of life in Tuscany is thirty or thirty-one years ; in Denmark, thirty-six years. In Home, one in thirty-two dies annually. Thornwell states that 50,000 human beings die annually from the effects of malaria in Italy ; but this can scarcely be founded on trustworthy data. The hospitals of Home are filled with fever patients in the summer months. In one hospital, St. Spirito, there were 6000 fever patients in the summer of 1818 (an unfavourable year), and in one day, the 25th of July, 1130 lay there. In Leghorn, where the hospitals receive patients both from the , Maremme in the south, and from the marshy districts in the north, the fever patients constitute one-sixth of the whole. It is natural that mankind should flee from such danger- ous dwelling-places, and that only necessity or the desire of gain can compel them to fix their abodes here. Hence these districts offer a striking contrast, in respect to population, to the elsewhere so universallythickly-populated regions of Italy. Lucca is well known to be one of the most populous and best cultivated regions of Europe, and the desert tracts of Viareg- gio are found close in the neighbourhood. While, in the ex- traordinarily fertile valley of the Arno, house is joined to house, and garden to garden, we may travel for miles over the neighbouring Maremme without seeing a house, without meet- THE ITALIAN MALABIA. 53 ing a human being, perhaps excepting some few whose aspect bears ample testimony to the unhealthy character of the atmo- sphere. The contrast is greater than between the heaths and the inhabited districts of Jutland. The deficiency of population must, of course, have great influence on the utilization of the land. "Where, as in the Maremme and in parts of the Campagna, woods and copses are frequent, charcoal-burning is carried on. Here we see numerous fires, and long lines of mules laden with charcoal, which is sent to far-distant places. In the marshy districts near Ostia graze herds of black buffaloes in a half-wild con- dition. In the Roman Campagna vast herds of bulls and other horned cattle are kept, which are watched by mounted men, furnished with long poles — the riders of the Campagna, as they are called. In autumn, numerous flocks of sheep and goats migrate from the mountains of the Abruzzi to the plains of Puglia, to graze there during the winter ; whereby, as in Spain, great obstacles are placed in the way of agri- culture. The gathering of the cowherds, the owners, and the cattle merchants, brings a population of 20,000 persons into Foggia during the winter, while this town is almost deserted in the summer. Similar migrations take place also in the Maremme ; the mountain herdsmen come down into the lower regions, with their cattle, in winter, and pay a small rent for the right of grazing. Agriculture often becomes difficult under these circumstances, yet it is carried on; usually, however, the land is applied to this purpose after having been used for grazing during a number of years. The great Roman Campagna is divided among only 250 owners, and these lease their property to great contractors, who live in Rome, and keep a manager and a few fixed servants. The whole of the field-work is carried on with hired people, who ordinarily come from a distance ; they are poor mountaineers from the Abruzzi, Parma, and Modena ; they get but a mo- derate amount of food, are badly clothed, and thus frequently fall an easy prey to sickness and. death, when they'go to rest under the open sky, after the efforts and fatigues of the day, at harvest-time in summer. In the valley of Cesina, the Grand-duke has divided the land into small holdings, and erected roomy and handsome buildings, but the speculators who bought them have let them again ; and if we ask these 54 THE EARTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. tenants how they fare in summer, their answer is, that they go to the mountain-towns, and only leave a few servants behind. It is very evident, that tax-gatherers and soldiers sent into these districts must be regarded as lost, and that frequent changes must take place to prevent too great a sacri- fice of life. But has this unhealthy atmosphere been always the lot of Italy ? Historical data afford an apparent contradiction in regard to this. On the one hand, it is certain that regions now uninhabited on account of the malaria, were populated in antiquity. According to Pliny, there were thirtj'-three cities under the dominion of the Volscians in the Pontine plain, which statement, however, is surely exaggerated. Rome ex- tended, as the ruins show, through districts which now suffer from malaria. Many renowned cities lay in the modern Maremme ; Ostia was at that time a great city. Villas were built on the gulf of Baia ; the ruins of Passtum show that a great city existed there in antiquity. The same is true of the Adriatic coasts, in places where the atmosphere is now unhealthy. On the other hand, expressions are not wanting in the older authors, which testify that they were acquainted with the malaria and its effects. Cicero, in his treatise " De Republica" says : " Romulus chose for the foundation of Rome a healthy spot in an infected region." Horace, in his well-known Epistle to Macsenas, describes the mouth of August as that " which brings fever with it, makes parents tremble for the lives of their children, opens wills, and calls the undertaker* into activity." Livy states, that in the time of the republic, five centimes after the foundation of the city, " the Roman soldiers demanded that they should be allowed to remain in Capua, instead of returning to the unhealthy and infertile environs of Rome." Cresar, " De Bello Oivili," mentions the unhealthy atmosphere in Puglia and near Brundisium. Cato, " De Be Busticd" speaks of theimportance of a healthy situation for an estate, and mentions that field-labours cannot be undertaken in summer in places where the. atmosphere is unhealthy. Yarro counsels those who possess an unhealthy estate, by all means to sell it, or, if they cannot find a pur- chaser, to leave it altogether. Columella, who lived near Tarentum, speaks of the injurious influence of the marsh-air THE ITALIAN MALA.BIA. 55 upon human beings. Seneca speaks of the deserts of Puglia (deserta Apulia"). This contradiction can scarcely be explained in any other way than by assuming that the malaria prevailed in antiquity, yet was not so widely spread nor so active in its effects as at present. Even if we could assume — which, however, is extremely doubtful — that a greater strength of body, a simpler mode of life, and clothing more suited to the climate, were capable of diminishing the susceptibility to a certain extent, yet we certainly cannot presume that the malaria could be without influence upon the then closely-populated, but now unhealthy and desert tracts, especially since it seems settled by the facts above mentioned that the malaria was active in other places at that time. It is a widely diffused opinion that the cultivation of the soil, and the increasing population of the country, afford defensive means against the malaria, and that it gains the upper hand when agriculture goes to decay, and the popula- tion diminishes ; and it is imagined that the devastations caused by the invasions of foreign races have especially con- tributed to cause the great predominance of the malaria. We cannot well appeal directly to the inverse proportion of the violence of the malaria and the density of the population, without confounding the cause with the effect. But, on the other hand, it cannot be denied that the formation of stagnant pools, deficient drainage, and many natural consequences of the decay of agriculture, may contribute to increase the evil we are discussing. P. Savi calls attention to another circum- stance — namely, that a broader seam has been gradually formed on the coast by the alluvium of the rivers, and that the sand-dunes have increased through the action of the sea, and obstructed the outflow of the water. The Italian governments had much inducement to oppose this public calamity, and have made experiments against it at various times, but often with little success. Leo X. sacri- ficed many men whom he commanded to settle as colonists in the Campagna. Pope Pius commenced the drainage of the Pontine marshes. By digging canals, a considerable por- tion was laid dry, and not a little is at present under culture ; but there are no dwellings there, and the labour is performed by hired people; for the air is still constantly unhealthy. 56 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. The experiments which the Grand-dukes of Tuscany made, in the last century, in the Maremme, by dividing the estates and introducing colonists, had not a successful result ; the colo- nists died or removed. The experiments with the morasses between Viareggio and Leghorn were more successful. The unhealthy atmosphere was very prevalent here ; it extended even to the gates of Leghorn. The town of Viareggio pos- sessed, previously to 1733, only 330 inhabitants, poor fisher- men and galley-slaves. The mortality was so great that one in fifteen died annually. But sluices were erected, which closed with the flood-tide and prevented the entrance of the sea- water, while they opened with the ebb so as to give an outlet to the fresh water. By these and several other contrivances the climate has been essentially improved. In 1823, Viareggio contained 4267 inhabitants ; many families possessed summer- residences there, and used sea-baths. The environs also, and the wholly marshy strip of coast, have less noxious air at present, and it has vanished from Leghorn. Another suc- cessful experiment was made in the Val di Chiana. The river there had no outlet, the water stagnated, and the atmosphere was very unhealthy. Drainage was effected, in particular by means of the colmate, as they are called. The river is diverted to the sides, over the land, and allowed to deposit its mud ; by this means the soil becomes elevated, and, consequently, an outflow becomes possible. Since that time, agriculture, popu- lation, and health, have made a gladdenin'g progress in this valley. Similar undertakings have lately been engaged in on a much greater scale. Great activity is displayed in the im- provement of the Maremme ; in particular, great works have been commenced in the marshy plain at the mouth of the river Ombrone. Here also endeavours have been made to elevate the land, and to effect a drainage of the river, and pains taken, by sluicing and other means, to prevent the inter- mixture of the sea with the fresh water. The effects are as yet doubtful, but since successful results have gradually pre- sented themselves in other places, there is hope also for these new experiments. Such conquests of land and people bring life and prosperity, and not death and poverty. REPETITIONS IN THE VEGETABLE KINGDOM. 57 » CHAPTBE VII. REPETITIONS OF NATUBE IN THE VEGETABLE KINGDOM. " Nattjbe is infinitely rich and varied, and the gifts which are showered down from her cornucopia cover the surface of the earth." This is a thought to which utterance is fre- quently given, and even a limited acquaintance with nature convinces us of its truth. Yet, notwithstanding this, we hear, especially among naturalists, the proposition " that Na- ture is sparing ; that she never makes use of the more where the same thing may be done with the less." There are cer- tain facts which seem to strengthen the last proposition, and I will direct attention to them in discussing the repetitions of Natwre so far as refers to the Vegetable Kingdom. It is very well known that the seed of any given plant produces another plant, which displays most exactly the ex- ternal form, the internal structure, and the chemical compo- sition of the parent-plant ; on this depends the whole idea of the species. If the effect upon our imagination had not been weakened by the constant observation of this fact, it would appear to us one of the greatest miracles of nature. In the seed there exists not the slightest trace of all those parts of the often so complicated structure, the flower ; these are formed much later, and yet is it certain that they are formed exactly in that way and in no other. We are able to go even further back : in the seed we see the germ, and in this traces of the root and terminal bud ; but if we examine the seed in the flower, in its state of ovule, the germ appears to us, even under the highest magnifying powers, to be com- posed of a few minute vesicular cells ; from these cells all those parts, and no others, must be gradually developed; while minute cells, exactly resembling them, will be developed, in another seed, into a plant perhaps differing from it as widely as the poles. How there can reside in these cellules a formative force, tending exactly in the direction thus de- termined, as though an ideal figure, gradually to be realised, floated before it, — this is to the most deeply-initiated natu- ralist a wonder which he can only marvel at and not compre- hend. 58 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. But the marvellousness becomes still more increased when we reflect that this repetition of the forms takes place, not only from the parent-plant to its next successor, but through thousands of generations ; for everything indicates that the forms have been maintained unaltered since the last great disturbance of the earth's surface. Examples do occur, however, of deviation from the normal types of the species, produced by the agency of man ; I mean, the varieties which have originated through cultivation in the course of time. The cereals, the fruit-trees, and ornamental plants, offer plenty of examples. "We see the dahlia, the pink, and the auricula, vary in an extraordinary degree ; yet this variation is strictly Umited ; through all the changes the typi- cal or fundamental form is retained ; a stock, vary as it may, never becomes a wallflower ; a dahlia never an aster. Here, as in so many other cases, a sphere is given for hiunan action, but fixed and definite boundaries are assigned to it. The kind of repetition of which we have just spoken, occurs within the compass of the individual species ; we might term this the genetic repetition, or the repetition through descend- ants. In like manner as the peculiarities of the species are re- peated in all individuals, those of the genus are repeated in all the species which it includes, those of the family in all the genera which belong to it ; but we will not dwell longer upon this point, because, not only do the greatest deviations occur contemporaneously with the repetitions — for the species are, as it were, variations on the theme of the genus, those of the genus variations on the family — but because, under these circumstances, the genera, in particular, often exhibit within their limits so much transformation and gradation towards other families, that it not unfrequently becomes difficult to ascertain the primary form. On the other hand, there is a different kind of repetition, which might, perhaps, be called the systematic, or repetitions in the developmental series of plants. For there exist in the vegetable as well as in the animal kingdom, series of forms in which the plant and the organs of the plant exhibit grada- tions of structure from the simple to the complex, and in which some groups have one particular organ, others different organs, especially developed ; we can observe the transition from the grasses, with a simple structure of leaf and flower, EEPETITIONS IN THE TEQETABLE KINGDOM. 59 to the palms, in which leaf, flower, and fruit, acquire a far greater development, and to the lilies, but above all, to the orchids, in which the flowers exhibit a still higher degree of development ; while, however, the flower has thus acquired its most perfect development in the group of the Monocoty- ledons, Nature has commenced another group, namely, that of the Dicotyledons, which, as a whole, stands higher than the former ; has proceeded, as it were, from a point lying some way back, from plants in which the leaves, flowers, and fruits, have a simple structure (conifers and catkin-bearing trees), and rises gradually to a more perfect stage of development. A parallelism thus arises between two primary groups, and thereby a kind of repetition of the same conditions in each. The borage family (JBoraginaeem or Asperifolia), to which the forget-me-not belongs, is a very natural group. The plants belonging to it have a flower with a five-parted calyx and corolla, both regular, five equal stamens and four small, hard, one-seeded fruits, from the middle of which projects a single style. Nearly allied to these is the labiate family (Jbabiatcd) ■ they have exactly the same fruit ; the calyx and corolla are likewise five-parted, but three of the segments of the latter form a lower lip, the other two an upper lip, so that the corolla has become irregular; only four stamens exist, two of which are long and two short, but intermediate states show that this irregularity arises from the non-deve- lopment of the fifth stamen, while two of the others are arrested at a certain point, so that they are shorter. In a third family, that of the potato (Solanacea), the flower is re- gular, calyx and corolla five-parted ; five stamens . are met with, just as in the borage family, but the fruit is essentially different, being a two-chambered capsule, or berry, with nu- merous seeds affixed upon two projecting placentas. Then, just as the regular flower of the borage family becomes changed into the irregular one of the labiate plants, the regular flower of the potato family becomes irregular in the snap-dragon family {ScrophulariacecB), which possess exactly similar fruit, but have the corolla divided into two lips, while the stamens are two long and two short, precisely as in the labiate plants. Here, therefore, there is a parallelism in the development, a repetition of the transition from a regular to an irregular flower. 60 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. To a third kind of repetition I would apply the name of the geographical, or the repetition according to climate. Our northern Polar countries have a very peculiar flora ; a quantity of dwarf perennial plants with large flowers, often of beautiful colours, partly belonging to genera which are unknown, or only play an inconsiderable part in temperate countries. But we find them again, either in the same or nearly allied species, upon the Alps, the Carpathians, the Pyrenees, the Apennines, and the Caucasus, when we ascend to the height of 6000 feet or upwards; nay, even in the most elevated regions of Peru and on the Himalayas we meet with some of them. When we ascend to a height of 3000 feet on the Apennines, the beech, which is sought in vain in the plains, becomes the prevailing tree, and with it appear the birch, the raspberry, the hazel, and a number of other North European plants, which greet the northern naturalist as friends from home. In the highlands of Mexico are found large forests of conifers ; in those of Java, species of oak and chestnut. The temperate countries of the southern hemisphere, too, present the prospect of various forms of vegetation which are found in the temperate zone of the northern hemisphere, and are missing in the torrid zone ; some species even exist both in Europe and in New Holland, South Africa, and the most southern part of South America, but ordinarily they are different species of the same genera. This repetition presents itself either as substitution* when many species occur in both hemispheres, or as representa- tion* when one place possesses but one or a few species of the genus which is richer in another place ; for example, one Stapelia is found in Europe and one in North Africa, while very many species occur in South Africa. Two species are met with in the Mediterranean of the genus Mesembryan- themum, which is very rich in South Africa. "We may also demonstrate an historical repetition. The stratified rocks contain remains of plants, the place of which (* These terms do not appear to us well chosen. That of substitution should rather be applied to such cases as those of the Ericaceai of the Cape of Good Hope, occupying similar conditions to the Epacridacem of Australia ; the Cacti of Mexico substituted for the Euphorbia! of tropical Africa, &c. Representation occurs in such cases as that of Chamairops humilis in Europe, and Chamairops Palmetto in North America— the corresponding but different conifers of Europe and North America, &c, &c. — Ed.) EEPETITIONS IN THE YEGETABLE KINGDOM. 61 in the natural groups we are able to determine. The older coal formation is particularly rich in ferns, calamites (JEquisetacece), and lepidodendra (Lycopodiacem) ; in the more recent coal formations Cycadece and conifers present them- selves. Although scarcely any one of them belonged to species which exist at present, and it is improbable that they could have survived the great revolutions of nature, there are nevertheless many genera and families common to the ancient and modern worlds, and in this way many of our forms of vegetation are repetitions of those which existed at a time when man was not. There is still another kind of repetition which I might call habitual repetition, or denominate mimicry, if this expres- sion were not at variance with the subjection to law which exists throughout nature, but to comprehend which our powers are often insufficient. A few examples will explain what I mean by this. We are all familiar with the cactus family, remarkable for their fleshy, often leafless stem, and the extraordinary variety of forms which they display ; sometimes appearing as upright angular columns, sometimes as flattened, and leaf-like, as globular, or cord-like bodies. But we meet with euphorbias with columnar, fleshy stems, exactly resembling the columnar Cadets, excepting that they contain milky juice ; their flowers and fruit have not the least resemblance to those of the Cactem. Not only are the columnar Cacteee' aped in the group of euphorbias, this is the ease also with the globular forms, and, moreover, various species of euphorbia corre- spond to the foliaceous Cacteee (JPereshim) . A climatic paral- lelism here exists, for the true home of the Cactem is in the dry, rainless regions of Mexico and Chili ; the fleshy euphorbias occur in the arid districts of Africa, in the desert zone, in the Canaries, on the coast of Abyssinia, in South Africa, and in Arabia. Other groups of plants also become fleshy in these regions, as Stapelia and Ceropegia among the asclepiadaceous plants, and Oacalia among the Composited. But in the euphorbias, as also in some stapelias, the mimicry goes fur- ther than mere fleshiness. In the genus Mutisia, we have the remarkable sight of a compositous flower with the ten- drils of a leguminous plant. In Begonia fuchsioides, the leaves are similar to those of a fuchsia, and very different 62 THE BAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. from the other forms of leaf among the begonias, and the colour of the blossom likewise reminds us of the fuchias. We have another most striking example in certain Brazil- ian plants, which, although possessed of perfectly developed flowers and fruits, mimic, as it were, in their leaves and stems, groups of plants of much lower rank. Lacis fucoides resembles certain sea-weeds so much, that it might be mis- taken for one by a person who did not see the flowers. MJniwpsis scaturiginum strikingly resembles a Jimgermcmnia. Another remarkable instance of the repetition of an inferior group of plants is met with in the root-flowers, as they are sometimes called (Bhizanthece), plants with quite perfect flowers, which, however, bear a striking resemblance to the fungi in aspect, texture, and, to some extent, in inter- nal structure. They grow as parasites on the roots of other plants ; they are generally destitute of leaves, and possess merely scales, of some other colour than green, which take the place of these. Hqfflesia, Aphylleia, and Langsdorffia, belong to this group. In Casuarina, a large tree of the South Sea Islands, there is a remarkable repetition of the mode of branching of the TSquisetaceas. Thus we meet with many instances of repetition in nature. Ought we, on that account, to call Nature sparing and nig- gardly ? Just as little, in my opinion, as we could call her spendthrift, when looking exclusively to her great multi- formity. Biches and poverty, parsimony and profusion, are human ideas ; the laws of nature stand exalted high above these. ALPINE PLANTS. 63 CHAPTEE VIII. ALPINE PLANTS. We all know the mighty influence heat exerts over the vegetable kingdom ; we are aware that it is the want of suf- ficient heat which arrests vegetable life with us in the winter, that it is the first warmth of spring which calls forth stem and leaves, the higher heat of summer which tempts the flowers out, and ripens the fruit and seeds ; that it is the warmer climate which gives South Europe a richer vegetation than North Europe, and that the still warmer climate within the tropics produces the greatest abundance and variety of plants. Thus heat is manifestly the great awakener of vegetable life. But plants are of very different natures ; the degree of temperature which produces phenomena of vitality in one, is incapable of awakening them in another. At present we will devote our attention to those which are called into life by the lowest degrees of temperature — to those which, so to speak, gain the victory over the foes of vegetable life, over frost and snow, and which, therefore, in a climatal point of view, deserve-to be called the first-born of Elora, even as those ferns of which we find remains in the coal-measures are the first- born in an historical point of view. These vegetables, which the slightest degree of heat is capable of calling forth, have a peculiar stamp, and constitute a peculiar flora. We meet with them in the Polar countries of the north (even in the plains and on the coasts), in Northern Lapland, in the most northern parts of Siberia and North America, and on the islands which lie in the northern Icy Sea ; we find this flora in regions where the snow covers the earth, where the lakes are frozen eight to ten months of the year, and where icebergs are drifted along the sea in the midst of summer. , We meet with the same flora again further south, when we ascend to a sufficient elevation upon a mountain. If we start for a ramble into the maritime Alps, from the Mediterranean coast of the south of France, we first meet with orange 64 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. gardens, olive groves, and thickets of myrtle, laurel, and ever- green oaks, above which stone-pines, and here and there isolated date-palms, lift their crowns ; at a greater height we leave this vegetation behind, we wander through woods of chestnut and oaks with deciduous leaves ; still higher we meet with an old northern friend, the beech; and yet higher, the gloomy woods of pines, firs, and larches ; finally, we leave these trees also, all arborescent growth ceases, low bushes accom- pany us for some distance further, but soon make room for small herbs ; last of all, the everlasting snow, which covers the earth during the warmest summer months, sets a limit to the growth of vegetation. In this way, by ascending from the Mediterranean to the snow-line, and traversing the different zones of elevation upon one and the same mountain, we may in one single day behold as many different floras as if we travelled months long from the Mediterranean to the Arctic Ocean. The zone which lies between the upper limit of the growth of trees (tree-limit) and the lower Emit of the everlasting snow (snow-line) is called the Alpine zone, and the plants met with here are called Alpine plants. This flora has so remark- able a resemblance to the Polar flora that it must be com- bined with it. Not only are almost all the families and the greater part of the genera the same, but even a considerable number of species are common to both — a fact the more re- markable, since there lie between the Alps and the nearest Norwegian mountains, where this flora occurs again, extensive plains, or at most only mountains not rising high enough for these plants to flourish upon them. The Polar flora, or, as we may also call it, the Alpine flora, is not merely met with in the higher regions of the Alps — the highest mountains of Europe, — it is found everywhere in Eu- rope and the northern part of Asia and America, where moun- tain masses present themselves high enough to furnish a suit- able climate to these plants in their more elevated districts. Hence we find this flora in the Pyrenees, in the Sierra Nevada, the Carpathians, and the Caucasus ; in the Norwe- gian, Scotch, and Icelandic mountains ; and traces of it are seen on the highest peaks of the Apennines and the Grecian chains ; it is seen also in the Altai and other Asiatic moun- tains, and on the higher chains of North America. ALPINE PLANTS. 65 What are the characteristic features of this flora ? The first characteristic mark is the absence of trees ; even hushes are only found in the lower parts of the Alpine zone, and here the rhododendrons, or Alpine roses, play a prominent part, forming a dense scrub. The short summer, limited to two or three months, and the nocturnal frost which occurs even during the warmest months, make it readily conceiv- able that no plant can produce long shoots here ; from the large, weighty masses of snow, and the violent winds upon these heights, it is clear that the young stems or shoots must be broken, and that, consequently, when stems or shoots do present themselves, they can rise only a few inches from the earth, or that, at all events, supposing them to acquire some length, they are compelled to creep along upon the earth or cliffs. As a general rule, trees are the longest-lived plants. The opposite extreme is represented by the summer-plants (an- nuals) so frequent in our temperate climate — plants which grow up, flower, ripen their seed, and die, in the same year that they spring up from the seed. The annual plants are missed in the Alpine and Polar flora, just as the trees are ; and this is readily explained. The summer is far too short to allow the whole course of life of a plant to be completed within it ; if it ripened seed in a favourable year, it would fail in one less so, and the species would hi such case readily be lost for ever. Consequently, only perennial herbs and certain small shrubs are displayed in this flora ; the stems are often subterraneous, and this alone, or a short stem above ground, is retained in the winter season. The growth in height being so much restricted, the development by lateral shoots is favoured, and thus many Alpine herbs exhibit bundles or tufts of short stems, which frequently form little cushions or turf-like patches upon the cliffs, with their leaves and flowers. Proper mould Is very seldom formed in this zone ; the soil is either the naked cliff, where plants grow either in the crevices in which water collects and mosses prepare a place for the larger and more highly developed plants, or in drifted gravel and disintegrated rock, which is permeated by the descending snow-water, and which is constantly increased by fresh detritus being washed down. To enable a plant to 66 THE EARTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. grow under such conditions, long roots are necessary ; and we see this to be the case in most Alpine plants, and espe- cially in ithose which grow in the drift. When we examine the stems of Alpine plants, and their leaves, another peculiarity strikes us ; ibis is the absence of hairs and thorns. The Alpine plants are smooth, as it is very inaptly termed — unarmed. This shows how incorrect that opinion is, which regards the hairy covering of plants as a provision against cold ; for if any kind of plant could re- quire this, it would certainly be the Alpine vegetables. Look- ing generally at the matter, we perceive that moist soils bear smooth plants ; dry soils, plants furnished with hairs and thorns ; since, therefore, the soil in which Alpine plants grow, is kept constantly moist by the flowing down of melted snow, we see in this the reason of that peculiarity of Alpine plants. While the stem above ground is so small in Alpine plants, the flowers are ordinarily very large in proportion to the whole plant. The snow has scarcely melted, it lies still close at hand, when the Alpine plant bears beautiful flowers ; it is as though their development was hastened in order to take advantage of the unusually short summer, as though the whole force of growth was applied to the development of the flowers as rapidly as possible, and therefore, from the shortness of the stalks, partially buried in the ground, they appear to spring imme- diately out of the gravel. The considerable size of the flowers in proportion to the stem, is a very striking feature of Alpine vegetation ; it is one of the differences distinctly evident in comparing an Alpine plant with one of the same genus in- habiting the plains. Another characteristic feature of the Alpine plants is de- rived from the beautiful, clear, and unmixed colours dis- played by their flowers — the purest snow-white {Dryas, various species of Draba and Saxifrage), the loveliest sky- blue (Gentiana, Soldanella, Veronica, Campanula, Phyteuma, and the dwarf forget-me-not, Myosotis nana, which far excels its well-known congeners of the plain in beauty), the most beautiful rose-colour (species of Primula, Azalea, Silene acaulis), a pure yellow {Ranunculus, Potentilla, Viola biflora, Papaver). "When the flowers of the plains, especially those of the coasts, are compared with these mountain plants, it is ALPINE PLANTS. 67 remarkable how impure, how dirty, the former generally ap- pear. At the same time spotted flowers, or a mixture of several colours in one flower, are more rare in Alpine plants. While the Alpine flora offers a rich treat to the eye, through its large flowers, and their pure colours and lovely forms, they are, on the other hand, incapable of pleasing any of the other senses of man. With a few exceptions, which indeed refer only to plants occurring solely in the lower part of the zone, the flowers of Alpine plants are scentless. An in- creased degree of heat, generally also dryness of the soil and atmosphere, favour the development of those secretions which are volatilized from flowers, whence the south of Europe, for example, has far more sweet-scented plants than the north, and the number of odoriferous plants in general increases towards the equator ; it is therefore readily to be compre- hended that the Alpine plants, which grow in a constantly moist soil, at the lowest possible temperature, cannot be odoriferous. It cannot be said, however, that Alpine plants are desti- tute of secretions, for these exist abundantly in the roots and stems of many ; examples of bitter plants are particularly noticeable in the Alpine zone — for instance, the gentian family ; and most of them yield a nutritious fodder for cattle. On the other hand, the Alpine flora displays no poisonous plants. In no other part of the globe has nature been so trans- formed by man as in Europe, where cultivation has produced, in some regions in thousands of years, in others in centuries, such vast changes, that there are few districts in which the vegetable world can be seen in its original condition. Among these few, the Polar countries and the Alpine zone take the first place. No plough furrows, no spade turns up the earth, no grain, no garden plant is sown, no tree planted ; man uses these regions for grazing alone, and in a manner which differs little from that in which it would occur if Nature were left wholly to herself. The Alpine flora acquires an exalted interest from the strong contrast between the vegetation and that which sur- rounds it. The bare, steep cliffs, the vast, white snow-fields, and the bluish glaciers, are immediately in contact with e 2 68 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. elegant little plants decked with flowers of the purest colours. Loveliness is mated with majestic grandeur. Here, in the north, we possess a flora resembling that of the Alps in several respects ; this is our spring flora. Spring opens with herbs bearing brightly-coloured flowers ; some, like the violets, primroses, anemones, and drabas, belong even to the characteristic genera of the Alpine flora. But the Alpine flora exhibits a spring followed by no summer or autumn, a spring which is quickly, and at once, lost in winter. This short but lovely spring renders the Alpine flora still more interesting ; it is a splendid butterfly, living but a few weeks, after lying buried in earth as a chrysalis for many long months. MOUNTAIN BAUBLES IN THE NORTH AND SOUTH. 69 CHAPTEE IX. MOUNTAIN BAUBLES IN THE NOETH AND SOUTH. Not only lias the mountaineer a preference for the moun- tains, explicable from the especial value every man attributes to his home, but the inhabitant of the plain who visits them finds something especially attractive in them. Not only does the child of the rocks feel the deep longing for these mute friends at home, but the stranger who has made their acquaintance also finds them often rising vividly in his me- mory and calling him to them. Although the circumstance that Nature has been less altered, and appears more in her original shape in mountain regions than anywhere else, cer- tainly does contribute much to produce this effect, yet the chief cause cannot lie in this, for then a heath or a sandy desert ought to have the same effect. Rather must the chief cause be sought in the marked features which nature pos- sesses in mountain regions. Just as a human countenance with striking features, even when these are not handsome, is readily seized and kept long in the recollection, while the rounded forms of an inexpressive face are easily passed over, and still more easily forgotten ; so also does the aspect of nature in mountains, by the sharp contours and contrasted outlines of the earth's surface, stamp itself much more deeply in our memory than an uniform plain or an undulating hilly country. To this are added, the abundant variation which mountain scenery displays in the more detached, and frequently narrowly confined portions, and the great change which elevation produces in climate, and thereby also in the vegetable and animal kingdoms. These remarks will perhaps be my justification for de- scribing here a few mountain scenes which I have met with in the course of my travels. In the summer of 1812 I visited the mountains of Norway, in company with the enthusiastic botanist, Christian Smith, who a few years later fell a martyr to the study of botany on the Congo river in Africa. We had rambled through the mountains of Upper Tellemark, so rich in natural scenery ; 70 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. we had ascended the high, snow-covered, isolated Gousta; visited the foaming liiukanfoss, one of the largest waterfalls in Europe ; and intended to travel over the wild mountain tract which lies between Tellernark and Hardanger. It is a characteristic of all the Norwegian mountain- ranges, that, compared with others, they are very flat upon the top, and that the east side has a gradual inclination, while the west side falls down abruptly to the deeply-pene- trating fiords. This character is marked here, perhaps, more strongly than anywhere else in the vast mass of mountains. Since the mountain-chain rises gently on the east side, the various zones of vegetation lie rather side by side than above one another. "While in the Alps and other chains one ascends quickly from the zone of the deciduous woods to that of the Conifers, then into that of the Rhododendrons, and from thence into the zones of the Alpine plants and of the snow, thus having a variety which can be witnessed in the space of a few hours, — in the eastern parts of Norway one travels several days in the zone of the Conifers, several days more through that of the birch, and from there, equally long through the zone of the Alpine herbs and of the snow, before the ridge is attained. The entire extent from the eastern foot of the chain to the water-shed, amounts here to at least 112 miles. "We found ourselves then, in August, near the great lake Miosvandet, which lies 2700 feet above the sea, in the zone of the birch. The pine and fir had vanished. But few fields were seen around the farm-houses, for a harvest of ripe barley can seldom be reckoned upon. The life of the in- habitants stands quite in the transition from that of the agriculturist to that of the nomade. They have indeed fixed winter dwellings, but during the summer they ascend with their cattle into the mountains, to make use of the more elevated pastures. "We left the cultivated land further and further behind us. The homesteads lay now half or whole days' journeys apart ; all roads and paths disappeared ; heaps of stones at wide intervals were here the wanderer's guide. He increases them by adding a stone as he passes by. We sought in vain for a companion to guide lis over the main ridge to Hardanger. "With great trouble we succeeded in inducing a countryman from the last house in Tellernark MOUNTAIN BAMBLES IN THE NOETIC AND SOUTH. 71 to guide us to the chalets, which the Hardangers have on the east side of the water-shed ; there we hoped to meet with further assistance. "We now ascended the zone of the Alpine shrubs, where all growth of timber has ceased; where, however, little low bushes and dwarf herbs, bearing large and brightly-coloured flowers, alternated with the naked cliffs and running streams. ~YVe here reached the first clialet of the Hardanger people, where the herd-girls, according to the custom of the district, came to meet us with a large, white-scoured milk-bowl, and the invitation, " Sit down, rest thyself, and drink!" In this little colony there were only girls ; they were brought up early in the summer and fetched down in the autumn ; the great plateau, the vast snow-fields, lay between them and their home, some forty miles away. They, therefore, did not venture to go over the mountain, and could not be our guides. Our companion from Tellemark could not travel further, but returned home. So far our position was un- pleasant ; but we found ourselves in the midst of the beauti- ful Alpin'e flora ; as botanists, therefore, we did hesitate to remain, although we did not know when we should get on further, were not in a position to return, and therefore saw ourselves separated from all the world. The girls, who had found that we were not vagrants, cleaned out one of their milk-huts for us. This stone hut, but imperfectly protected from wind and rain, was our abode ; a skin and a few coverlets our bed ; barley bread, milk, cheese, and groats, our food. But the vegetation repaid us for all hardships ; for, although we were surrounded by bare, treeless — in some cases, snow- covered rocks — particular places exhibited a very beautiful and rich vegetation. On one spot of about twenty square feet grew thirty different, bright-flowered Alpine herbs. These vigorous herbs afford rich nourishment to the cattle, which here spread themselves about the rocks, and return home spontaneously to be milked. "When evening approached, cows, sheep, and goats, flocked in from the neighbouring rocks ; they were called by name, by the girls (" silver- white," &c), to be milked, and receive from their hands a gift of salt, which causes them to return at the proper time. In the course of a few days, accident led a Hardanger peasant past our dwelling ; his intention was to go on to 72 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. another chalet, to fetch butter and cheese, and then to return to Soefiord, in Hardanger, so that he was ready to be our guide. The journey over the snowy ridge being too long for one day, he preferred to pass the night on the snow. But we chose to complete it in one stage, although we foresaw — as actually happened — that in spite of our setting out at earliest dawn, between three and four o'clock, we should not reach the shore of the fiord before midnight. This ramble, which we undertook a few days after, led us over the most barren rocky tracts and snow-fields. During the whole day we saw neither human beings nor domestic animals ; only flocks of wild reindeer and ptarmigans inhabited these sterile districts, and not a tree or bush, nor even a blade of grass, presented itself. The snow completely covered the ground over large tracts ; in other places it had partially melted, but lay in the hollows, forming gigantic bridges over the mountain torrents. Masses of vapour and clouds rolled over the rocks. The rough ground, the damp snow, tired the feet, and the shining surface of the snow dazzled the eyes. As we advanced, a high and widely-extended snow-covered ridge began to show itself in the west; this was the great " Folgefond," which lies beyond the fiord, but, from the narrowness of the latter, appeared to rise from the rocky plateau over which we were travelling. "We did not descry the fiord itself \mtil we ap- proached the edge of the western slope, and immediately after, when we arrived at the declivity, we beheld one of the most remarkable pieces of natural scenery I have ever met with. Imagine our having gradually reached, by several days' ascent, a height of 4000 or 5000 feet, and now all at once standing at the top of a steep slope which stretches down to the level of the sea, while directly opposite rises another equally steep and still higher snowy ridgu ; so that the sea is here narrowed into a fiord or inlet, the breadth of which, at the bottom, amounts to only about a quarter of a league ; it is really only a narrow deep cleft in the mass of rock. "Woods present themselves somewhat further down, on the steep sides of the mountain, and quite at the bottom a very narrow border of bright green cultivated patches, dotted with wooden houses. The sun was just about to set when we arrived at the edge of the slope ; the descent was very difficult, but in the highest MOUNTAIN EAMBLES IN THE NOETH AND SOUTH. 73 degree striking. Afterwe had passed through the treeless zone, ■pre descended through the birch woods, then through the pine forests, which were decorated with the showy blossoms of the foxglove, at the very foot the odour of fresh-mown hay was wafted to meet us, we arrived among fields of almost ripened corn, cherry-trees bowed by the weight of ripe fruit, and blooming rose-bushes. Pretty cottages, built of" wood, stood close together, and one of them was opened to us. "What a change, after wandering about for several weeks on the bare plateaux and over the snow-fields ! The change seemed the more magical from our having made the descent in one of those half-dark summer nights which in Norway are still more beau- tiful than with us. It was a scene especially calculated to demonstrate clearly the influence of elevation upon climate and vegetation. "We will now change time and place, and pass from the cloud- wrapped mountains of Norway to the clear summer sky of Italy. Observing from Home, at the beginning of June, 1818, that the snow was disappearing from the summit of the Apennines, I prepared for an extended pedestrian excursion. My intention was to travel first northwards to Tuscany, and then to follow the chain of the Apennines, along its whole extent, to the southernmost point of Calabria; this plan I carried into execution. I undertook this ramble, which lasted eright or nine weeks, alone, an ass which I bought in Rome, to carry my baggage, being my only companion through the greater part of the journey. After having traversed a portion of the west side of the Roman Apennines, ascending various of the elevated sum- mits which lie in the proper main chain, I crossed the latter near Norcia, and found myself toward the end of June in St. Benedetto, on the coast of the Adriatic Sea, surrounded by olive, wine, and orange gardens, and fields whence the corn had already been harvested. Prom here I turned to the highest peak of the Apennines, which is appropriately called Grransasso dTtalia, and which lies not in the principal mass, but upon a lateral branch of Apennines stretching out toward the Adriatic Sea, between Teramo and Aquila. As far as Teramo the journey lay still in the hilly zone, 74 THE EAETH, PiANTS, AND MAN. where the woods were principally formed of evergreen oaks, the thickets of myrtles and lentisks. But near Isola commenced a steep ascent to the base upon which Grransasso rests, and on the same day that I had left Teramo in the morning, and passed through Isola at noon, I found myself at evening high above in the zone of the beech. As one is here above the limit of corn-culture, and above the elevation at which fixed dwellings are met with, I was under the necessity of taking up my night quarters with some herdsmen, who here tended sheep, under the open sky ; they had no huts, but passed the night by a fire, rolled in their sheepskins. Tired and thirsty, I asked for milk, but was denied it ; not from ill-will, but because the herdsmen have the superstition that to give fresh milk to a stranger will bring harm upon their cattle. Of course it was of no use my assuring them that cattle-feeding flourishes in Switzerland and Norway, although the people come to meet the stranger with a bowl of milk. " Costume del paese" was the answer, and in this point my guide from Isola took part with his countrymen. After a pretty cold night, at break of day I continue my ascent of the mountain. I soon passed the upper limit of the beech, and found myself at the immediate foot of Grransasso, upon the Arapietra (stone altar) as it is called, 5500 feet, a kind of terrace, and in the midst of the loveliest Alpine flora. Higher up, the mountain became continually steeper ; on the south and east sides, Grransasso is so steep that it scarcely can be climbed ; on the north side a ravine makes it more accessible, but this was covered with snow. By digging steps in the hard snow, it was possible to get nearly to the summit of the mountain, but one almost perpendicular cliff remained ; this I could not ascend, but, measuring by the eye, I esti- mated it at about 150 feet above the point where I stood, and the whole height of the mountain, according to baro- metrical measurement, 8935 or almost 9000 feet above the sea. I returned to the north side, and passed the night in a village called Pietra Camela, from whence I next day crossed the chain upon which Grransasso rests ; the elevation of the mountain-pass amounted to 7200 feet. On the north side much snow still lay for me to cross ; the steep south side, on the contrary, was almost devoid of snow, and on this I arrived the same day at Aquila. MOUNTAIN EAMBLES IN THE NOBTH AND SOUTH. 75 Bringing together in a brief view the differences of the mountain characteristics displayed in the two rambles here narrated, attention may be particularly directed to the fol- lowing remarks. The condition of the atmosphere certainly deserves the first place. The west coast of Norway is well known from its misty, cloudy sky, and its constant rains ; although the east side has a clearer air, this is not so much the case in the mountains, and especially the portion of them which lie nearest the west side. The summer, too, is very rainy. This almost constant rain and fog, these eternal clouds which envelope the moun- tains, of course prevent the forms of the mountains making themselves very prominent. Except in a few smiling moments, Nature exhibits grandeur indeed, but bears a certain gloomy stamp. Very different is it under the clear sky of Italy. Although clouds and rain are more frequent, even in summer, on the mountains than in the plains, the air is ordinarily clear, and therefore more transparent than in the mountainous countries of the north. The prospect thus becomes freer. The outlines of the mountains, under a more beautiful light, are sharper and purer. The second point in which an important distinction is seen, is the form of the mountain-chains. I have already spoken of the great mountain plateaux in Norway ; if we ascend either the crest of these expanses or the higher yet usually rounded summits of the mountains, we look over immeasur- able waving surfaces, either displaying snow-fields or con- sisting of mere naked, cliffs. The little portions overgrown with Alpine herbs are not large enough, and the plants them- selves are too small, to contribute to the character of the landscape. The valleys of the east side lie too far away to be seen, and on the west the fiords are usually too narrow to be visible from the rocky peaks ; the sea also is too far away, even when the fog does not veil the prospect. Prom the Apennines, which present no flat tracts of any considerable size up above, and where the peaks usually rise steeply up- ward, the prospect is on this account alone more extensive ; for example, from Gransasso one looks down into the fertile valley on the north and south, nay, the coast-plains and the Adriatic Sea lie within the sphere of vision. 76 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. Snow is seen, even during summer, in both chains ; but in the south it is, of course, only found at a greater height. The large snow-fields on the Hardanger chain do not lie higher than between 4000 and 5000 feet. Gransasso, which rises to 9000 feet, has masses of snow only on the north side in July, and in August and September scarcely any is to be found. In both chains the zone of the pretty Alpine herbs adjoins the snow-line. In Norway the birch comes next ; further down the pine and the fir are the most important forest-trees ; the beech is unknown on the mountains of Norway, occurring first on the plains in the south of Norway (Laurvig), and sparingly in a few isolated spots in the diocese of Bergen. On the Apennines, on the contrary, the beech is the tree which ascends highest, and adjoins the zone of the Alpine herbs. This geographical distribution is the more remark- able when we compare it with that of the corn-culture. "While the beech is met with only in the most southern part of Norway, barley is cultivated even in Lapland, not far from the North Cape ; on the Apennines, on the contrary, the cul- tivation of corn has almost ceased before the zone of the beech is reached, and this goes several thousand feet higher. The cause doubtless lies in the peculiar dependence of corn-culture on the summer heat, while the beech is more affected by the heat of the whole year. In those northern regions the sum- mer is much warmer than at that elevation on the Apennines which enjoys the same mean annual temperature. In the more elevated regions the feeding of cattle is the most important occupation, in both chains ; but, taken alto- gether, it is more considerable in the southern mountains of Norway than in the Apennines : in the former they bring not only sheep and goats, but also horned cattle up into the Alpine pastures ; in the latter scarcely anything but sheep and goats are pastured. In the former, stone huts are built, and a complete Alpine husbandry pursued ; in the latter, the herdsmen wander about with their sheep and goats, and sleep in skins under the open sky, or live in mud-hovels. In both places the herdsman's life is nomadic ; in summer the cattle are driven up the mountains ; but while in Norway the cows are kept by stall-feeding in the valleys during the winter, the sheep which have browzed during summer on the Alpine pastures of the Abruzzi, are driven to the great plains of MOUNTAIN EAMBLES IN THE NOBTH AND SOUTH. 77 Puglia, where the climate is mild enough to allow them to re- main in the open air through the winter. If we extend our comparison to the inhabitants of the mountains, the advantage falls to the Northmen. With the Norwegian peasant, we see in the dwelling and in its fur- niture proofs of his activity ; he has a taste for reading, and his life ensures strength and self-dependance. The herds- man of the Apennines is indolent, ignorant, and little open to cultivation. ¥e must not, however, overlook here the in- fluence which the political condition and religion exercise. The Norwegian mountaineer is a freeman, and owns his farm ; the herdsman of the Apennines is the servant of a monastery, of a landholder, or of a tenant. The religion of the Northman allows him freedom of thought ; the Italian herdsman is a bondsman also in this respect. 78 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. CHAPTEE X. In those places where the surface of the earth is greatly elevated, the inequality does not usually present itself as an isolated mountain, but as a combination of several — as a mass of mountains ; sometimes a ridge, narrow in proportion to its length, with peaks upon the crest and sides of the chain ; sometimes a group of mountains heaped together, usually upon a flat base ; or finally, as a great Alpine country, with several ridges, lateral branches, central summits, promon- tories, and many peaks, one within another and side by side. In all these mountain masses we find valleys through which rivers flow, side- valleys, the smaller torrents of which termi- nate in the main streams, frequently terraces and elevated plateaux. These are the characters of the Alps, the Pyrenees, the mountains of Norway, the different mountain systems of Germany, and the Apennines. Etna presents a very different appearance. Although of very considerable circumference and height, it is merely a single mountain, an isolated, conical projection from the earth's surface, without ridge, plateaux and terraces, even destitute of valleys and rivers. On this account, when we take into consideration its compass and elevation, it is the only one of its kind in Europe. Its circumference amounts to more than ninety-six miles. The height is 11,300 feet ; it is therefore much higher than any point in all Northern Europe, higher than the highest peak of the Apennines and of the Greek mountains, and equals the Pyrenees. Only the summit of the Alps and a couple of points in the Sierra Nevada surpass it in elevation. Etna is entirely separate from the rest of the mountains of Sicily ; to the south lies the plain of Catania ; on the west and north are the rivers Giarretta and Alcantara ; toward the east is the sea. The base of the mountain is of roundish form, but the extent from north to south is somewhat greater than from east to west. The highest point lies in the centre, and thus the entire mountain acquires the form of a cone. The sides are gentle declivities, except at the peak itself, which is a steep cone, terminating in a funnel-shaped excava- ETNA. 79 tion, the crater, the mouth of which is ahout two miles in diameter. Etna does not present a single valley : the great hollow on the east side, which bears the name of the Valle di hue, is formed of the sides of an ancient and enormously large crater. But Etna has several hundred smaller craters, separate coni- cal little mountains with funnel-shaped cavities. Through these have the enclosed volcanic vapours made their way out in the course of past time ; but although certain of these craters are individually large, they are too small in propor- tion to the whole mass to interfere with the conical form of the mountain. Some he at a small elevation ; for example, Montirossi (from which came the lava-stream that laid waste Catania), at a height of 3000 feet. The soil is everywhere volcanic; it consists, namely, of lava, volcanic sand, or volcanic ashes, or of masses of stone thrown out in the eruptions. The quantity of sand and ashes naturally increases in proportion as the craters are approached ; and as they are more frequent, the higher one goes, the ashes also increase with the height ; the uppermost part is almost covered with them. Closely connected with the form of the mountain and the nature of its soil, is the characteristic peculiarity of Etna, that it is destitute of rivers, brooks, and springs. The rain- water, and that coming from the melting of the great beds of snow, flows down the steep sides, without being gathered into rivers, because there are no valleys there, and on the upper part no turf, which elsewhere contributes so essentially to collect the water ; the loose ashes and the hard lava are equally ill calculated to favour the formation of springs. These occur only on the lowest parts of the mountain, although very sparingly, and at the base are a few small streams. The inhabitants are restricted, especially in the higher parts, to cistern water. The isolated position and the contracted form of Etna especially fit it for exhibiting the great influence which eleva- tion has over climate, and as a consequence, upon plants. In few places, perhaps in none in Europe, are the various zones of vegetation so evidently visible and so well defined as here, or can so readily be surveyed in one view. This has led its inhabitants, without their having the least conception 80 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. of botanical geography, to divide the mountains into three very natural zones, into the cultivated zone, the wooded zone, and the naked zone. In the cultivated zone, going up to a height of 2500 feet, we find extensive fields in which wheat and barley are cul- tivated, the former for the food of man, the latter for horses. The vine-culture is still more widely spread ; the hot, dry summer, and the dark-coloured soil, especially fit this zone for it. In some places holes have been dug in the black volcanic ashes, and filled with mould, in which vines are planted ; although the roots do not extend beyond the mould, the vines, surrounded by the black ashes, bear excellent grapes. The cultivation of olives is also considerable on the lowest parts of the slopes of Etna ; of the almond and fig no less. Oranges only flourish where water is sufficiently abun- dant ; thus Etna does not offer any great superabundance of this fruit. Cotton and saffron are also grown to some extent. The cultivation of the soil and the population of this zone are so extensive, that indigenous vegetation is scarcely to be found ; it is confined almost solely to the lava-streams which are too recent to afford a thick enough layer of mould. The plant which chiefly prevails, and is characteristic here, is the Indian fig, as it is called (Opuntia vulgaris), the succulent stems and shoots of which derive nourishment from the aqueous vapour of the atmosphere. This plant grows, there- fore, on the dryest soils, and flourishing so luxuriantly there, its fallen shoots and roots soon form a layer of vegetable mould, adapted for the growth of other plants. Besides this important advantage, it is applied to various uses by the inhabitants ; with its entangled shoots and bundles of spines, they form an excellent and almost impenetrable hedge, while the juicy fruit afford a cooling refreshment during the hot summer, and hence are eaten in great quantities. The second region is the zone of woods, extending from 2500 to 6000 feet. The orange-tree, the cotton, and the olive, are lost ; almond and fig-trees, as well as vines, gradually disappear. Corn and wine are indeed still grown here, but the woods gradually assume the greatest share of the soil, and the felling of timber and grazing are the chief occupa- tions here. In the more elevated villages, wheat is no longer ETNA. 81 cultivated, but its place is taken by rye, which is here called German corn, probably because it has been introduced from Germany. The -woods in the lower part of the zone are prin- cipally composed of oaks with deciduous leaves, and chestnuts. Here are found the chestnut-trees so celebrated for the cir- cumference of their trunks, among which the " Castagno di cento cavalli," the circumference of which at the root amounts to 180 feet, is especially renowned. The height of this tree being very small in proportion to the circumference of its trunk, it looks at a distance like a group of trees, and not like a single one. "When approached, the tree still presents five trunks, standing close together, but their diverse direc- tions, and the traces of the exterior of the main-trunk existing here and there between them, indicate that they were formerly connected and formed one great trunk, which is in great part covered with earth. But the very fact that the main stem has been destroyed, makes it doubtful whether several trunks did not exist originally, blended together. Tet other trunks are found in the neighbourhood, not indeed so large, but of very considerable circumference, and so well preserved that it can be seen that they are not composed of several trunks. Among others, the " Castagno di St. Agata" is seventy feet, and the " Castagno della Nave" sixty-four feet at the root, and fifty-seven feet at a distance of four feet above the root. The upper part of the zone of woods is chiefly covered by beeches (which are not met with below 3000 feet), a species of fir (Finns laricid), and birches. There is no corn-culture here, and very few or no villages are seen. This part of the zone is turned to account by feeding swine upon the mast, and goats in the pastures ; the wood is also felled for timber. A species of broom (Genista etnensis), forming a small tree or tall shrub, is universal throughout this zone, and charac- teristic of it. "When we pass the tree-limit in the Alps, the Pyrenees, and the Norwegian mountains, we come upon the beautiful Alpine flora already described ; little shrubs or low herbs, with comparatively large, elegant flowers of bright colours, and exhibiting great variety of form and colour. This Alpine flora is wholly deficient on Etna, although the elevation is quite sufficient to produce an equally cold climate. The G 82 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. vegetation above the tree-limit is extremely poor, in the highest degree uniform, and there is not a trace of the forms or characteristic features presented by the Alpine flora. This zone also is divisible into two. The lower is still a little ver- dant ; the prevailing plants are the tragacanth shrub (Astra- galus siculus), which forms little round cushions in the lava and ashes, welcome to the traveller tired of climbing were they not beset with countless spines ; then the berberry bush, which is here quite dwarfed, and covered with sharp thorns ; and finally the juniper. In the upper portion, from 7500 feet to the summit, these shrubs have vanished ; the ashes and lava are almost bare ; scarcely ten species are found altogether, and of these, two are principally seen scattered among the ashes, namely, our common tansy (Tanacetum vulgare) and a grounsel (Senecio cTirysantliemif alius). It is not difficult to explain why the upper part of Etna has so poor a vegetation, and is entirely destitute of the Alpine flora : the atmosphere does not act so readily upon the solid lava and hard ashes as on other rocks, which it converts into the drift, so fertile in the Alps ; then again, every fresh eruption prevents, by new lava-streams and new showers of ashes, this transformation of the soil, and at the same time destroys the plants that are beginning to appear ; finally we have to add, the great deficiency of springs and brooks. Etna has a different aspect at different seasons and under different circumstances. This, perhaps, deserves to be more minutely explained, and I shall take leave to present a few little traits which I witnessed in my journey s over this remark- able mountain. I saw Etna in its winter character at the beginning of March, 1830. Three-fourths of the mountain, namely, the whole of the naked and almost the whole of the wooded zones, lay beneath an unbroken covering of snow, while at the base all the fields were clothed in the brightest green of spring ; peas, beans, and flax, were already in full blossom, the flowers of the almond had fallen, and given place to the leaves, and the fig-leaves were beginning to unfold ; the mea- dows were decorated with hyacinths, narcissuses, crocuses, anemones, and countless other flowers. Etna stood there as an enormous cone of snow, with its base encircled by a gigantic wreath of flowers. ETNA. 83 It was towards the conclusion of August and beginning of September, 1818, that I first visited Etna. The mountain was then in its summer garb. The snow had entirely dis- appeared, except patches in little hollows of the very highest part, and these were only visible at the very spots themselves. The forests looked green and fresh, but the cultivated zone displayed a withered, dead aspect. The almost rainless sum- mer, the excessive heat, had dried up almost all the grass and herbs here ; only the evergreen shrubs and trees remained with their hard, shining leaves, together with the cactus {Opuntia) and agaves, which could bear the drought on ac- count of the abundant stores of sap. In the lowest zone the botanist's occupation was gone ; I therefore hastened to- ward the wooded zone, with the view of investigating this and the naked zone. I was obliged to renounce all idea of measur- ing altitudes this time, since my barometer had been broken in Calabria, and another which I had obtained in Calabria proved useless when I arrived at the wooded zone. The weather was, and had been throughout the past month, clear, dry, and warm. But scarcely had I advanced beyond the limits of the woods, when clouds began to gather around the peak, and before I had reached the "English House," as it is called, a little building of lava, directly at the foot of the highest crater, it was enveloped in the densest fog, and rain began to fall. I had made up my mind to take up my quarters in this uninhabited house, which lies 9200 feet above the sea, and is buried under the snow during eight or nine months of the year ; two mules had carried up my baggage, and in addition water and fuel, for of these necessaries, which do not fail in other mountains, not a sign exists here. The weather became worse and worse ; thunder, lightning, and storm raged ; the rain poured down, it hailed and snowed, and the thermo- meter sank to 38° Fahr., while on the same day the tempe- rature had risen to 78° Eahr. in Catania, at the foot of the mountain. I was here alone with my guide, for two days, in the most elevated dwelling in all Europe ; I could be almost certain that no other human being passed the night in the same stratum of air. Kept within the walls of the house by the weather, the time might have seemed long enough, but the naturalist has always the good fortune to find occupation everywhere. It struck me to make a thermometrical obser- g2 84 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. vation every half hour, so as to find out the course of the temperature during twenty-four hours at so great an ele- vation ; and at the same time, as it had been agreed to observe it several times in Catania, to learn the difference between the temperature at the sea-level and at a point elevated more than 9000 feet above it. On the third day the weather cleared lip, it became bright, and I was enabled to ascend the highest crater, which forms the summit of Etna. The prospect from the peak of Etna has something quite peculiar about it, arising from the fact that the mountain is completely isolated and conical ; no peak, ridge, or terrace, interferes with the view, and it is almost as if one floated in the air in a balloon. Land and sea lie beneath one, as on a map ; with perhaps the exception of the western quarter, one can see all over Sicily ; if Etna stood in the centre instead of the coast, the whole island, although it occupies a surface of 600 square geographical miles, together with a portion of the adjoining sea would be overlooked ; as it is, one sees beyond the north coast alone, and over this the Lipari islands, which lie there as if one could grasp them in one's hand ; the southern point of Sicily is also seen ; towards the east the Straits look like a narrow stream, on the opposite side of which is Calabria, the mountains of which rise 6000 feet, and yet one sees the sea beyond them. The great shadow which Etna throws is very remarkable ; in the morn- ing, when the sun has risen, lighting up the Straits and the east side of Etna, the west side of the mountain and that part of Sicily lying w r est of it are still in obscurity. At that time Etna was in the most perfect rest, the crater was closed, and only slight clouds of smoke arose from it. Tn the following year I had an opportunity of seeing the volcano in activity. "While the eruptions of Vesuvius succeed one another quickly, sometimes stronger, sometimes weaker in degree, those of Etna are much more rare ; but when they do happen, they are the more violent. No eruption had occurred since 1811 ; I felt myself particularly fortunate, therefore, that when I again visited this mountain in May, 1819, an erup- tion had commenced the day before my arrival. I hurried at once up the mountain during the night, and reached before ETNA. 85 daybreak a point, Montagnola, about 9000 feet above the sea, which was above the new crater. Here the most glorious opportunity presented itself to rne of seeing the flames from which the smoke arose, and from which the glowing stones were hurled ; somewhat below was the outflow of the lava, and as there was a precipitous fall towards the Valle di hue close by, the lava-stream formed a cascade at least several hundred feet deep. In the valley below, or more correctly in the gorge, it spread out and flowed like a broad river of fire a mile long ; the woods set on fire by the lava burned in bright flames, the rye-fields were already destroyed by the lava flowing down, and the inhabitants of the nearest villages were anxiously calculating which way the stream would pro- bably take. But it soon stopped ; and this, as I convinced myself a few days after, when I visited its base, by the lava masses becoming heaped upon one another, and thus forming a dam for the stream itself. While I was watching this eruption, and endeavouring to approach the crater as closely as was advisable, the sun rose. The sun's light struggled with the so-varied lights of the crater-fire, the burning lava, and the blazing woods. At length the sun triumphed ; the colour of the fire of the crater became greyish, that of the lava changed to a white smoke ; all around was covered with snow. This combination of fire and snow, and this contrast and congest of the different illuminations, was one of the most interesting natural phe- nomena I ever witnessed. Eight days later I visited the principal crater. The Eng- lish House and the principal part of the naked zone were covered with snow ; at the summit I measured the height of the mountain, while the earth trembled under my feet. The new crater had grown into a considerable hill in the course of eight days, through the stones and ashes thrown out. When I sailed from Messina to Naples, in the beginning of July, five weeks afterwards, the crater was still burning ; and as Stromboli was in flames at the same time, I had two burning volcanoes before me at once. 86 THE EARTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. CHAPTER, XI. BAMBLES IN THE KAEST. The great Alpine chain which bounds Italy like a gigantic wall upon the north, separates at its eastern portion into three principal branches, the southernmost of which extends in the direction from north-west to south-east, as far as the northern bays of the Adriatic, and joins further to the south- east the Dinaric Alps, which run along the east side of this sea. That portion of this south-eastern branch of the Alps which lies nearest to Trieste, namely, the greater part be- tween Gorz, Trieste, Fiume, and Mount Nanus, is called the Karst. During an eight-weeks' stay in Trieste, I made many rambles among these mountains, and I will here endeavour to convey the image which they impressed upon me of the natural conditions of this region. Most of those striking features which characterise the great mountain masses of the Alps vanish in the Karbt. Here we find no summits rising 12,000 ok 15,000 feet above the sea, covered with eternal snow, forming a zone 4000 and 7000 feet high, from which blue glaciers stretch their arms along the flanks and into the valleys ; the most elevated sum- mits of this eastern portion attain in general only 4000 or 6000 feet ; few rise above the snow-line, and no glaciers extend down from them. "We also miss here the sharp crests of the Alps, the steep declivities, and the deeply-excavated valleys, which form regular longitudinal and cross grooves ; this portion of the Alps approaches to a plateau in form, being broad, and, in comparison with the rest of the Alps, flat ; the most elevated portion presents an undulating and exceedingly irregular surface, from which rise several peaks and crests, and over which go passes ; these are not, there- fore, as is usual in the Alps, formed by two closely-adjoining cross-valleys. The condition of the water-courses is closed- connected with this. On the south the chain comes so close to the sea that no proper river can be formed here, and although we do find streams in the interior, tributaries of the river Isonzo, lying on the west, their course is irregular ; and, moreover, several rivers are met with which have no outlet at all, or at all events no visible one, to the sea, in EAMBLES IN THE KABST. 87 some cases flowing into inland lakes equally devoid of outlet, as the Zircknitz lake, in others, lost in subterranean reservoirs. In regard to the character of the rocks also, the Karst mountains differ from most parts of the Alps ; instead of ex- hibiting a great variation of the structure, the Karst is com- posed of an uniform grey limestone, wearying to the eye. Numerous funnel-shaped hollows are met with on the surface of this limestone, not unlike volcanic craters in form ; but their composition sufficiently testifies that no volcanic erup- tions have taken place here. Both in the funnel-shaped hollows and on the level or undulating surface, we find innu- merable masses of fragments of limestone, of irregular form, very often perforated with holes ; sometimes large, sometimes small ; sometimes spread out in strata, and sometimes piled up in heaps, which are not unlike those of the burnt lime around lime-kilns. These heaps and beds of broken lime- stone often render rambles in these regions very fatiguing, and, unlike the promontories and cliffs of the Alps, they yield no compensation by producing picturesque views. This limestone is full of grottoes or caves, remarkable for their size and depth. Like many limestone caverns in Ger- many, they are lined with stalactites, which present a great variety of forms, looking like gigantic cones of ice — columns and galleries, in which the imagination, especially as the caverns are commonly illuminated only by the aid of torches, sees altars, palaces, temples, &c. The Corneal is undoubtedly the most beautiful of these grottoes. The visitor descends into one of those deep, funnel-shaped recesses so frequent in the Karst ; at the bottom is found a narrow entrance to the cavern, but it soon rises, and you enter a large vault sup- ported by columns ; soon you pass over a colossal bridge, formed by nature, beneath which a subterraneous river is heard flowing, or a subterranean lake is seen ; then you arrive at a projecting mass of rock, from which you look down into a pit, the bottom of which lies beyond the reach of the torchlight. According to my barometrical measurement, the greatest depth of this grotto is 400 feet lower than the entrance. The Adelsberg and Magdalen grottoes, both near Adelsberg, are of similar character ; in the first are found bones of the cavern bear (one of the beasts of prey of the ancient world) ; 8b THE EARTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. the last is especially remarkable from tbe Proteus (Hypoch- thon) being found in the great lakes lying at the bottom of the grotto — a remarkable animal never beholding day- light, the eyes of which are little developed and hidden by a membrane, and which, although a four-footed reptile, breathes all its life by gills, and has a rose-coloured body, so trans- parent that the colours of its viscera show through. In these grottoes also are found some peculiar insects, spiders and crustaceans, which are blind and of very pale colours — white, yellowish, or light brown. The grotto of St. Canzian is of somewhat different nature ; while most of the others have a low entrance, and require to be lighted by torches, this has a very large opening, and in spite of the great size of the grotto, is completely illuminated by the daylight. Quite at the back a small orifice is found into which the daylight shines, and at the bottom the pretty large river Rekka runs with great velocity into the grotto. Up, 500 feet above, on the mountain, which is completely hol- lowed out by the grotto, lies the village of St. Canzian. Be- hind the grotto lies a funnel-shaped hollow several hundred feet deep ; by descending with great labour into this, another sight is obtained of the river Rekka, flowing out from the back of the grotto. Here it forms a cascade, and after running a little distance along the ground, again hides itself beneath it, and, apparently, never becomes visible again. Some, however, think that it is the Uekka which emerges from the mountains as a short coast river, under the name of the Timavo, at a distance of about thirty miles ; this is navigable by small boats when it passes out from the cliffs. Near Planina, a river flows into the mountain in the same way, and in like manner another near Schloss Lueg, which lies in an open cavern. The Zirck- nitz lake exhibits another remarkable connexion between superficial and subterraneous waters, and has been renowned for centuries as a great natural curiosity. This lake, which is about five miles long, two and a half wide, and fifteen feet deep, sometimes loses all or nearly all its water, and then, after some time, regains it, frequently pretty quickly. It is said of this lake, that one can hunt, fish, and reap upon the same ground. When full of water it abounds in fish ; when dry, one may hunt hares over it ; and it is sometimes sown with buckwheat or oats. The lake appears, especially at one side, BAUBLES IN THE KABST. 89 to stand in connexion with subterranean reservoirs of water, and the increase or decrease in them seems undoubtedly to affect the quantity of water in the lake. Recent observations appear to show that the rise and fall of the lake goes hand in hand with amount of rain of the seasons and of the year ; and this corroborates the opinion that these subterraneous re- servoirs of water, considerable as they are, derive their origin from the superficial water, which flows down into the subter- raneous lakes or rivers through the calcareous fragments of the surface, through the crevices of the cliffs, and through the mouths of the caverns. This penetration of the super- ficial water down into subterraneous accumulations, in com- bination with the sparing amount of rain which is a charac- teristic feature of the climate of the south-eastern parts of Europe, causes the great deficiency of springs and wells in the Karst ; whence the inhabitants, as in Dalmatia, are for the most part dependant on rain-water collected in cisterns ; and in this we meet with another great difference from the rest of the Alps, so rich in springs and brooks. The absence of rain and moisture, together with the coat- ing of broken limestone over the surface, are certainly the most important causes of the very poor vegetation of the Karst. Northward of Nanus, between Adelsberg and Zircknitz, as well as on the northern declivity of the chains generally, fir-woods flourish, and on Nanus, beeches ; but the proper Karst, between Nanus and the sea, excepting solitary hollows and other isolated spots, where a few oaks and horn- beams appear, is destitute of wood. But the Karst is not only without woods, it is almost devoid of plants ; only here and there a juniper-bush, some little herb or a grass, springs from the heaps of limestone. This gives a totally different character from that of the Alps ; for these are remarkable for their forests and luxuriant meadows. Hence it will be readily concluded that the land is little fitted for corn-culture, and suited only for cattle-feeding ; here and there only have little patches been ploughed up in the hollows, in which a crop of wheat or oats is painfully coaxed out of the thin layer of soil, or in more favourable situations vines planted. Grass for sheep is met with sparingly here and there. The mountain-chain is consequently only thinly populated ; the 90 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. villages consist of miserable huts ; dirt and poverty prevail among the ragged natives, and beggars are met with every- where. The inhabitants, Illyrians of Sclavonian race, are at the same time a depressed people ; they are ruled by foreigners, who do not understand their language or their customs. The Karst and a large portion of Carniola thus exhibit the picture of barrenness, drought, sterility, and absence of life. To see anything beautiful, one must descend into the earth, where the brilliant torehlighted pictures transport the beholder into fairy land. Tet the inhabitant of the Karst can see the beauties of nature in full splendour above ground ; he need only wander to the border of the precipitous slopes of the mountain-chain, for then there lies at his feet the proud Adriatic Sea, over- arched by the clear Italian sky, and on the slopes themselves the fig and laurel grow wild, with a crowd of other plants characteristic of the Italian climate. The olive, the exclusive property of Southern Europe, widely extends its grey cover- ing, the vines form arcades, the almonds in spring spread a rosy carpet over the gardens, and the Triestans have built innumerable villas to shield them from the burning heats of summer. But although we are in Italy here, we soon observe not only the vicinity of the Alps in general, but above all that of the Eastern Alps, which, being lower, allow the passage of the cold winds which come from the great plains of Eastern Europe and Western Asia. The mountain-wall which sepa- rates South from North Europe is interrupted in two places by depressions — in Erance between the Pyrenees and the Cevennes, between them and the Alps, and here at the Karst. Through the former come the milder western gales, but here the cold and dry east winds, which sometimes blow with violence, under the name of borra. When this horra pre- vails, the ships cannot He in the harbours, and it often does great mischief by land and water. Hence we seek in vain for oranges, which are cultivated at the Lago di Grarda and Lago Maggiore ; and the olive is only secure from frost to the west of Trieste, where the steep Karst itself affords a shelter against the wind ; in the valley running in toward the east of Trieste, where the wind has full play, all the olive-trees BAMBLES IN THE KABST. 91 were frozen in the winter of 1788-9, from which cause very- few are met with there now.' In the first half of April, I witnessed a storm which appeared to me like a hurricane, but it was only called a borrin (a diminutive of borra) . It brought such cold with it, that the thermometer sank almost to the freezing point ; water froze in the ships in the harbour, the environs of Trieste were covered with snow, and buds of the vines looked as if scorched. The almond did not blow before April. The deciduous trees did not come into leaf until the middle of the month ; on the 23rd of April snow fell there, but melted directly. On the 1st of May, the Triestans cele- brated the appearance of spring by a visit to the neighbour- ing Bosehetto. 92 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. CHAPTER XII. CAPEI AND ISCHIA. The Bay of Naples presents one of the most beautiful pictures of natural scenery in our quarter of the globe. Under that clear sky which falls to the lot of the countries of the Mediterranean, the sea, which, like the atmosphere here, assumes a deep blue colour, runs into the land in a bay rounded in its general form, but broken by promontories. At the bottom of the bay lies the isolated, conical Vesuvius, 4000 feet high, and incessantly smoking ; along the south side stretch the mountains of Castellamare, among which Monte St. Angelo rises to 4700 feet, displaying forests of the northern beech, and on the upper portion a few sub- Alpine plants, while for some months of the year it is covered with snow. The north side of the bay is bounded by much lower volcanic hills, surrounding Naples on one side. Before the mouth of the bay, like two portal columns to the beautiful temple of Nature, lie on either side the islands of Capri and Ischia, which by their height and well-marked forms essentially contribute to remove the uniformity which the prospect over an unbroken sea- view to the west would otherwise display. Separately or together, according to the different points of view selected on the coast, these islands in some degree limit the field of vision. As seen from the shores of the Bay of Naples, these two islands present a remarkable difference in their outlines. One, Ischia, looks like a conical mountain falling off gradually, with its base considerably extended towards the east ; the other, Capri, displays very sharp, angular forms, and is divided by a fissure in the middle into two portions of unequal height. These varying outlines are most intimately connected with the geological characters of the islands. Ischia is wholly volcanic, Capri is formed of limestone cliffs. This difference becomes more accurately comprehended when the islands themselves are visited. The principal mass of Ischia is formed by the mountain Epomeo, 2500 feet above CAPRI AND ISOHIA. 93 the sea. This is no longer among the active volcanoes, the last eruption having taken place about 550 years ago (1301) ; but the latest lava-stream still lies almost bare, vegetation beginning only here and there with a thin coating of the greyish-white lichen Stereocaulon paschale. But although Eporneo no longer pours out lava, nor does its peak smoke, there still remain several indications of volcanic action upon the island. Warm springs present themselves in many places, and form the well-known medicinal baths , in several places warm vapours rise out of the earth — the fumaroles, as they are called, at which there is danger of burning the hand when it is thrust into the earth. The buildings bear perceptible traces of numerous earthquakes. Not a single valley is found on the island ; but the mountain is full of narrow, deep, and long fissures, which one can enter at the foot of the mountain ; they resemble narrow lanes between infinitely high walls, which become continually higher, and the fissures consequently darker, the further one goes in. It has a rather depressing effect when you penetrate in this way sometimes a mile into the mountain, the light from above constantly diminishing, the bleat of the goats and the song of the herdsmen constantly grewing weaker. Capri, on the other hand, as already mentioned, is com- posed of limestone. It is formed of two principal cliffs, the western, which rises as Monte Solare to nearly 2000 feet above the sea, and the southern, on the summit of which the ruins of the palace of Tiberius lie at about 1000 feet ; both portions rise extremely abruptly from the sea, and the landing-place is therefore in the fissure between them, where one meets steep cliffs at once on each side. The inaccessibility of the island has been known in history from the time of Tiberius to the last war. The access to the west side of the island where the town of Anacapri lies, is effected by a flight of several hundred steps hewn out of the rock, which runs down into the sea. The uppermost step of the flight lies nearly 1000 feet above the surface of the sea. The limestone mountains of Capri exhibit no clefts like those of Ischia ; but instead of these, the caverns so frequent in other limestone rocks. These are particularly abundant on the sea-coast, and as the sea penetrates into them, they 94 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. can be rowed into in boats. The Azuro, or blue grotto, is remarkable among these caverns. The entrance to it is so low that it ia inaccessible at high water, and it is usually necessary to lie down in the boat at other times in order to pass in, while the grotto itself is large, lofty, and vaulted. The dome presents to the eye a beautiful sky-blue colour. Not only do these two islands present very great differences in respect to outline and composition, the contrast holds in their vegetation. The distinction is seen most clearly in the cultivated plants. The loose soil afforded by the volcanic ashes is, in Ischia as in other districts, especially adapted for the culture of the vine ; while the hard cliffs of Capri, like the limestone hills of many countries of the Mediterranean, are particularly fitted for the growth of the olive. Hence Ischia, excepting the higher portions, which are either bare or overgrown with low chestnut thickets, may be regarded as one great vine-hill; Capri, on the other hand, with the excep- tion of the wildest parts, which do not admit of cultivation, and a few isolated patches devoted to corn-growing, is a great olive-Mil. A wonderfully beautiful aspect is displayed by the east side of Epomeo, which forms a semicircle divided into terraces, either when the vines are unfolding their young leaves in spring, or when they are covered with ripe grapes and parti-coloured leaves in autumn. The olives on Capri, with their grey leaves, have not such a beautiful appearance, but the greater variety of the forms of the rock compensates this deficiency. Both islands, and particularly the densely-populated Ischia, are cultivated to such a degree that it is difficult to recognise the characteristic features of the indigenous vegetation. But it appears to me that Ischia affords far fewer rare plants than Capri. Ischia, however, exhibits a remarkable exception to this, and at the same time a phenomenon worthy of notice in re- ference to the history of vegetation. In two of those smoking places above mentioned, the Pumarola di Frasso and the Pumarola di Cacciotto, grow two plants which are not found elsewhere in the kingdom of Naples ; namely, the sedge Gyperus polystachius and the fern Pteris longifolia ; they grow in the midst of the ascending vapours, and in earth so CAPEI AND ISCHIA. 95 hot that it bums the hand when an attempt is made to dig up the roots. The Neapolitan botanist, Tenore, who made this discovery, transplanted these two plants into the Botanical Garden at Naples, but they did not bear the winter there. Tenore con- sidered them as tropical plants, growing in Ischia in a hot- house formed by nature, and he at once built the bold hypothesis that these two plants belonged to the earlier period of the earth's existence, when Europe possessed palms, elephants, and the rhinoceros ; and that they had survived the revolutions of the globe which have intervened. This hypothesis can scarcely be accepted, for many reasons ; and the enigmatical character of the certainly difficultly explicable appearance of these two plants is lost when we call to mind that Oyperus polystacldus occurs on the north coast of Africa, and Pteris longifolia in Sicily ; for I found this fern near Syracuse, therefore much nearer than the stations previously known. But the question still remains, whether these two plants originated upon the island of Ischia at the same time they did in other parts of the globe, or have been subsequently conveyed to that island ? "When a species of plant occurs in common, and in both places widely diffused, in very distant regions — for example, in Lapland and in the Alps, Europe and New Holland, or Europe and Mexico — and is not found in the intermediate countries, it is assumed with most probability that it prima- rily originated in both places. On the other hand, I think that one must rather have recourse to migration for the explanation, if the distance from the nearest locality is not overwhelmingly great, and the plant has otherwise a very extensive area of diffusion ; conditions which here exist. Whether the migration has taken place by the aid of birds, or accidentally through human agency, I will not venture to determine. "We have a similar instance in Hungary. In a lake formed from warm springs is found the Lotus plant, which belongs to the flora of Egypt and other warm countries. It differs a little, it is true, from the Egyptian form, and hence recent writers have assumed it to be a distinct species — Nymphcea thermalis. But in any case, we have here the example of a 96 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. form of plant which occurs with unimportant modification, under especially favourable circumstances, in a country of much colder climate, and which could not maintain itself without these special local conditions. Perhaps we may add here, that a species of moss, Zygodon torquatus, Lieb. (Gritnmia tor quota, Hornschuch), which occurs without fruit in Herjedal in Sweden, is stated by Professor Steenstrup to occur with fruit about the volcanic springs of Iceland. NATURE IN THE SOUTH SEA ISLANDS. 97 CHAPTEE XIII. NATUEE IN THE SOUTH SEA ISLANDS. The South Sea, or Pacific Ocean, is the largest connected mass of water upon the surface of the globe. It is bounded on the east by America ; on the west by Asia and New Holland. Taking into consideration the many large islands which occupy the space between Asia and New Holland, it is permissible to regard the seas separating these last two portions of the globe as mere interruptions of continuity, and to view these two regions, together with the islands lying be- tween them, as a single vast continent. Then, since this continent and America approach so near together in the north that merely a narrow opening — Behring's Straits — remains, while they are separated so widely from each other in the south (the southern point of Van Diemen's Land and Cape Horn), the Pacific Ocean appears like a gigantic bay penetrating from the South Polar Ocean in between the two continents. These two continents exhibit very different characters where they border the ocean. If we except the most northern part of North America, from which projects the peninsula of Alaschka, continued by an arc of islands which reach almost to Kamtschatka — as also the islands which adjoin the coast, and the most southern part of South America, where rows of islands lie almost in contact with the coast — the remaining portion of the west coast of this continent is without islands ; the lofty mountain masses lie almost everywhere close upon the sea. Upon the opposite side of the South Sea, on the contrary, we find, throughout, a series of large islands, like bulwarks or dykes for the coasts, which in general exhibit no high mountains here. We shall not reckon these rows of islands, these bulwarks for the continent, as part of the South Sea Islands, since they differ very much from the rest in direction, in size, and in their whole character. In this way we exclude from the South Sea Islands, the Kuriles, the Japanese Islands, the Philippines, New G-uinea, New Ireland, New Britain, the Solomon's Islands, the New Hebrides, and New Caledonians ; indeed, even the islands of New Zealand H 98 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. are most correctly regarded as a prolongation of this great dyke. Therefore, excluding these bulwark-islands, and likewise the above-mentioned line of Aleutian Islands, the South Sea Islands are included between the two tropics ; only little solitary islands, like Easter Island, go a little beyond these, about to the twenty-seventh degree. The whole of these islands may be considered a special quarter of the globe, and called Oceania. On no other part of the earth's surface are so many islands collected together ; the number exceeds many thousands ; in fact, they are uncounted and innumerable, like the stars of heaven. But they are all very small. The largest, which considerably exceeds the rest in circumference — Owyhee, or Owai — is only a little larger than Corsica. This is an essentially characteristic feature of this part of the globe ; we are convinced of this very readily when we look at the other large groups of islands — such as the "West Indies, the Asiatic group of islands, and the Greek Islands. "When we reflect what differences present themselves, in Europe even, between the continent and the peninsulas, be- tween large and small islands ; what influence this has upon climate and plants, upon the habits and intercourse of the people, in spite of all the parts lying so near together, — we easily perceive how the circumstance that Oceania is com- posed of countless spots of land, sprinkled, as it were, over an extensive sea, must give a very peculiar stamp to this part of the globe. On no other part of the surface of the earth, of any considerable extent, are the land, and consequently the climate, the vegetation, animal life, and the inhabitants, ex- posed in a similar way to the influence of the ocean. The inhabitants are, so to express it, seamen on board rafts. At first sight it might appear as if the South Sea Islands were scattered in the ocean without trace of arrangement. A closer examination, however, shows us, in the first place, that they lie much nearer to Asia and New Holland, and adjoin the bulwark closely ; while there is a considerable dis- tance between these insular groups and America. That a fixed rule holds here, is seen from scarcely any solitary scat- tered islands being found in this interspace. It is in the next place evident, that the islands collectively form a curve NATUBE IN THE SOUTH SEA ISLANDS. 99 from north to south-east, from the northern Marians to Easter Island ; and that about the middle of this bow the Sandwich Islands lie considerably detached from the rest. In detail also, we remark some regularity in the distribu- tion ; we can separate certain groups and rows, albeit not by sharply-defined limits. On the north of the equator, the islands are arranged more in rows, which sometimes run north and south, as in the Marians, sometimes west and east, as in the Carolines, or north-west and south-east, like the Sandwich and Lord Mulgrave's Islands ; the groups of islands which lie in the southern hemisphere are arranged rather in roundish groups, as the Eegees, the Friendly and Society Islands, and the Low Islands. But outside these lie several detached islands in small groups, which cannot easily be reckoned to those main groups, especially in the remote parts, as Pitcairn's and Easter Island. "With regard to elevation above the sea, the South Sea Islands exhibit great variation ; some are very low, and rise but a few feet above the water, in fact, they are partly or entirely overflowed by high tides ; others are mountainous, and rise steeply to considerable altitudes. Mowna Roa, in Owyhee, is 12,000 or 13,000 feet high. When we reflect that this island, as already mentioned, is not much larger than Corsica, this height becomes the more remarkable. In the geological characters of the South Sea Islands, the coral formations play an important part ; and among them the Atols, as they are called (lagoon islands, Matus), deserve our first attention. These are very small islands, consisting of a narrow strip of land forming a ring, or of parts of a ring, round an internal lake (lagoon) . The ring is either quite complete or it presents one or more openings, it is frequently longish instead of circular, and the whole island rises very little from the sea — six or twelve, or at most thirty feet higher upon the windward than upon the lee side ; it is formed exclusively of corals and fragments of corals ; the breadth of the ring amounts to 1000 or 2000 feet, in part flooded at high water. The lagoon is not very deep, and be- comes gradually filled up by the fragments which are thrown up by the sea. When the ring is completed, and has attained a certain height, the lagoon becomes a fresh- water lake. The Atols are most prevalent in a zone from the Carolinas by h2 100 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. Mulgrave's Islands to the Low Islands, that is, from north- west to south-east, and they constitute the greatest part of Oceania. The second kind of coral-structures present themselves as coral-reefs, which lie at some distance from islands of various geological structure, but they follow the outline of the coast. These reefs are very narrow, annular, and low, essentially resembling the Atols in structure, especially when the island which is surrounded in this way is small. The water in the channel between the island and the reefs is rarely completely shut in, a variable number of entrances to it generally oc- curring. The depth does not exceed fifty fathoms, while on the outside of the reef it is not uncommon for no bottom to be found. The Society Islands, the Fegees, and a few smaller groups, exhibit these reefs. Lastly, the coral-formations occur as coral-banks, which rest immediately upon the coast of large or small islands, when the coast sinks gradually to the sea oris surrounded by shallow water. The Sandwich, the Society Islands, the Marians, and a few other smaller groups, present this structure. The coral islands are formed in the first instance beneath the surface of the sea, by the growth of coral animals — little slimy creatures which are connected together, and grow out in branches like plants, or in other forms. According to Forster's theory, which for a long period was universally received, the coral islands were supposed to have grown up gradually from the greatest depths ; but this opinion is now discarded, it having been shown that the coral animals are only found living at a less depth, and that they flourish best immediately beneath the disturbed surface of the sea, not, however, where they are laid bare at ebb tide, for in such places they die. Steffens, and with him most geologists, assumed that they were elevated submarine volcanic craters, which had their upper border clothed with corals ; but none of the Atols are more than a few feet in height, and it is not to be assumed that all craters would be of equal height. The most recent theory is Darwin's, according to which the three kinds of coral-formations above described come into a natural common relation. He supposes a slow sinking to take place. An island surrounded by coral-formations (coral-banks) sinks, and as this takes place, the coral grows up to the surface NATUEE IN THE SOUTH SEA ISLANDS. 101 of the sea, the most vigorous growth taking place on the outside, where the most abundant nutriment is found. An island then remains in the middle, around this is water, and this is enclosed by a ring of coral-structures ; in this way an island surrounded by a coral-reef is formed. By further sinking, the central island finally sinks beneath the surface of the sea, the lagoon is formed in the middle, the border is the coral-formation, and in this way an Atol is produced. The islands which are surrounded by coral-reefs, and those which have coral-banks around them, are of different geologi- cal character. Most of them are volcanic (lava, basalt, trachyte), a few are still in volcanic activity, as the Sandwich Islands and Tufoa among the Friendly Isles. There are, indeed, few regions of the earth which have so favourable a climate as the South Sea Islands. As they lie within the tropics, the climate is warm, but the heat is not oppressive, for the predominant ocean causes a cooling, and is thus a powerful equalizer. The mean temperature of the various points of Oceania falls between 75°- — 77° Fahr. From observations in the Sandwich Islands, the highest degree of temperature is 89° Fahr., the lowest 59° Fahr. above the freezing-point, and the difference between the warmest and coldest month is only 9°. Consequently, there exists here not only an eternal summer, but a constantly cool and plea- sant summer. The insupportable heat suffered in the desert- zone of Africa, and the coast regions of Peru and Chili, is here unknown. Generally speaking, there is no want of moisture and rain, and most of the islands have one rainy season, the summer. Moisture is especially present on the volcanic mountainous islands, for the currents of air loaded with vapour are arrested and cooled down by the mountains, and the vapours then fall as rain ; only a few of the lower islands, which, so to express it, cannot give themselves rain in this way, and which lie outside the zone of the regular rainy sea- son — for example, Easter Island, south of the tropic — suffer from drought. A cause contributing much to render the climate of the South Sea Islands constant, is, that they lie within the zone of the trade-winds, of the constant east wind, which is north- east northward of the equator, south-east to the south of it, and which so much facilitates the sea-voyage from America, 102 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. but compels those who wish to sail in the opposite direction, to seek a higher latitude. It must be observed, however, that in the neighbourhood of the limits of the zone of the trade-winds, and in the southern hemisphere a little within the tropics, the trade-wind is interrupted at a certain season by opposite winds ; here, consequently, the so-called monsoons occur ; and even within the zone of the trade-winds inter- ruptions of the rainy season occur. In consequence of the trade-winds, the mountainous islands have a weather and a lee side ; on the latter there prevails in part calms, which in the higher islands extend even many miles into the sea, in part the alternation in the twenty-four hours of land-winds during the night and sea-winds during the day. In the dwellings of the natives the doors are usually turned towards those alternating winds, and they thus obtain an agreeable coolness ; these dwellings, which mostly consist of great roofs resting upon short posts, are on the whole well suited to the purpose, and many travellers describe it as ex- tremely pleasant to repose on mats or mattresses in the sun in the day, or during the night. This climate is as healthy as it is agreeable ; here nothing is known of the deadly diseases of Java or Guinea ; nothing of the climatal fevers of the "West Indies. Man lives in the fresh sea-air as on board a ship, but without the confined atmosphere of the ship's cabin, and without the other dis- agreeables, want of exercise, want of fresh vegetables and water, which accompany a sea-voyage. "When a high degree of temperature is combined with abundant moisture, we usually see a luxuriant and richly- varied vegetation. Such is met with in the Asiatic Islands, in New Holland, Brazil, and in several tropical climates. But this is not the case in the South Sea Islands. On the volcanic islands, it is true, there is a superabundance of plants, and large plants, but the number of species is small and the variety consequently little. "While we are acquainted with more than 5000 species from Brazil, we know scarcely as many hundreds from the South Sea Islands. To this is added, that few vegetable forms are peculiar. The forms which pre- sent themselves are Asiatic or Australian, particularly the former; but not American, even on the islands which lie nearer to America than to Asia. NATURE IN THE SOTJTH SEA ISLANDS. 103 "We have already alluded to the prohable causes of the South Sea Islands having so poor a flora, in spite of their ex- cellent climate; namely, that the islands have probably originated since the time at which Nature ceased to produce new forms, which is true of the coral and probably of the volcanic islands ; further, because the islands are so small and lie so much scattered, which opposes a considerable hindrance to the migration of plants, both from the continent to the islands and from one island to another. The comparatively large number of ferns and Lycopodiaceae is remarkable ; they constitute one-fourth of the species. We cannot speak of all the characteristic wild plants, but we will name some of them. The cocoa-nut palm, the tall trunks of which render many of the low islands visible, forms forests, and affords the inhabitants fuel and timber, the nourishing nut, cocoa-nut milk, and oil. Pandanus odora- tissimus, with its stems undivided while young, and branched and curved in the older stages, with its leaves arranged in spiral lines, its pleasant-smelling flowers and large heads of fruit, which furnish a not very superior food. Casuarina equisetifolia, a large tree, distinguished by its jointed, leaf- less branches, resembling the Equisetum, or "horse-tail." The inhabitants regard it as a funereal tree, as the Europeans do the cypress. On the Sandwich Islands especially occurs the sandal-wood tree, the wood of which is carried to China to be used for smoking. Among the cultivated plants, the bread-fruit tree deserves especial mention — a large tree forty feet high, with leaves resembling those of the fig, and with large fruit, which through their mealy nature are very nutritious, and when cooked are said to taste like the finest wheaten bread. The plantain or the banana, with their large leaves and their like- wise nutritious fruits. The Taro, the tubers of which, like the potato, contain abundance of fecula, and are eaten boiled or roasted like them ; the cultivation of this, requiring so much pains, because it must be kept under water at one time of the year — a process effected in the Sandwich Islands by means of canals — is an evidence of the industry of the inhabitants. The Batatas, or sweet potato, and the yam, the tubers of which are of similar nature. The Tee-tree, which is regarded as a 104 THE EAKTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. symbol of falsehood and lying, because its leaves are some- times red and sometimes green, and the root of which is used for the distillation of a spirituous liquor. A kind of sugar-cane. Ava, a kind of pepper (IHper ineihysticum), from which a strong intoxicating liquid is prepared, which is said to be very congenial to the taste of the priests and some of the chiefs. The paper-mulberry, the fibre of which is used so industriously by the inhabitants for clothing and all kinds of textile fabrics. If Oceania is poor in species of plants, it is still more so in land animals. The only land Mammalia found by the first Europeans who visited these islands, were the pig, the dog, and the rat — animals which might have been conveyed thither, either with or against the will of the inhabitants ; and even these were not found in all the islands. Some few mammals may perhaps hare escaped notice, since the more recent naturalists who have visited these islands, mention the mouse, also a couple of species of bat and a small Rodent ; but in any case there is great poverty in mammals. The other domestic animals which the Europeans carried with them were therefore entirely new to the inhabitants ; hence, the horse, for instance, they called a pig for riding. There also appears to be a striking want of insects. The number of birds is greater. Marine animals, on the contrary, such as seals, fish, turtles, crabs, mollusks, &c\, are superabundant. The absence of mammals, and of all domestic animals except the pig, exercises so much influence on the economy of the people, that it certainly deserves mention as a cha- racteristic feature of Oceania. Common language, common customs and mode of life, agreement of features and the other physical characters, unite all the inhabitants of the South Sea into one race. The inhabitants of the Sandwich Islands understand not only those of Tahiti, but even the JS"ew Zealanders, and mere dialects of one fundamental language are spoken throughout these islands. The characteristic customs, the tatooing and the taboo, the placing of the dead in a kind of open tomb (morals), ornaments and decorations, the use of the double- canoe, the culture of the same useful vegetables, are, with in- considerable modifications, common to the most distant islands. NATUBE IN THE SOUTH SEA ISLANDS. 105 It is universally agreed that the inhabitants of Oceania are a fine and well-made race of people, differing less from the European, Arabic, and Indian, than from the other races. Their prevailing colour is far from what we can call black ; even among the lower classes of people, who are constantly exposed to the sun and air, it is scarcely more than yellowish or brownish ; among the higher ranks, especially in the female sex and in new-born children, it is scarcely darker than in the South Europeans. The hair is not woolly as in the negro, but smooth or lank ; the eyes are large, and not oblique and small, as in the Mongolian race ; the nose is separated from the cheeks and upper lip, the lips are not thick, as in the negro, and the limbs are well proportioned. I have mentioned the tatooing. This remarkable custom, diffused throughout Oceania, consists in decorating the body by cutting or pricking lines or figures in the skin. This operation is performed by artists educated expressly for it ; it is done with the wing-bones of the tropic bird, the end being carved into many points like a kind of comb ; with these points the skin is pierced until a wound is made, into which is rubbed charcoal or the stinging-nut, as it is called (Aleitrites triloba). The operation lasts several weeks, and very fre- quently additional figures are made afterwards. These figures are executed by the better artists with much regularity, symmetry and accuracy ; indeed, not unfrequently even with taste ; since, however, these artists require to be well paid with one or more fat hogs (the great wealth of the Tahitians), the less affluent are obliged to use the services of bunglers, and the poor go altogether without these decorations. It is readily perceived, that, looking at it as a decoration, the tatooing is to the Oceanians what clothes are to us ; at a distance these marks have actually a remarkable resemblance to clothes ; long streaks down the legs give the appearance of striped pantaloons ; the decorations on the arm resemble an elegantly stitched glove ; upon the leg, a stocking, &c. The lines are drawn upon the body so as to give the appearance of a very slender figure, so that even the corset is in a certain way known here. More depends upon a good tailor here than with us, for a man wears the coat all his life. Eashion, evidently, can have no influence, at all events, upon the same person. 106 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. The custom of the taboo is this : particular objects are declared to be sacred ; so that they must neither be touched nor used, either by anybody or by certain persons. Not only objects which belong to religion may be selected for this, but many other things. For example, at the birth of a child a bread-fruit tree may be planted ; it is taboo for every one else except the child. Pork is taboo for women, with some exceptions, however ; the head of a human being is taboo ; no one may place his hand upon it, or walk over the head of a person sleeping, &c. Corpses are strongly rubbed with cocoa-nut oil, and, en- veloped in a quantity of cloth, are laid upon stages in the open air. They are thus converted into a kind of mummies. The places where they are deposited are called Morals. I have asserted already, that the natural position of the South Sea Islands makes the inhabitants born seamen. It is no wonder, therefore, that they are excellent swimmers. Travellers assure us, that when one sees what a length of time daring the day, all, men, women and children, remain in the water, and what multifarious occupations they there engage in, one is tempted to regard them as a kind of amphibious animal, which can live as well in water as on land. This love of remaining in the water is so strong, that in the Sandwich Islands, where the higher native women now wear silk dresses, European bonnets, and shoes, it sometimes happens that they forget their new mode of life, and, chang- ing suddenly from smart ladies into sea-nymphs, swim round the ships. When the Europeans first visited the South Sea Islands, they found in most of them a tolerably advanced civilisation. In many there existed a government, agricul- ture — in some, as already mentioned, with artificial irrigation — and a not inconsiderable degree of industry as well as taste, exhibited in their clothes, canoes, and beautifully ornamented utensils. They also possessed bards. But the civilisation, and still more the religious and moral conceptions, had a direction entirely different from the European. But the inhabitants of Oceania, as. they were when first visited by Europeans — indeed, as they were fifty years ago — are found now only in little-frequented islands. All has com- pletely changed in Oceania in a short space of time. The inhabitants now dress in the European fashion, and have NATOtE IN THE SOUTH SEA ISLANDS. 107 adopted European customs ; tatooing declines greatly ; a double-canoe is now a rarity in Tahiti. In the Sandwich Islands, where Cook was killed by the savages about seventy years ago, are now seen European dwellings, warehouses, billiard-rooms, taverns, and sentinels in uniform ; they are annually visited by several hundred European and American ships, and fifty vessels may be seen there at once. "When it was wished to give Captain Beechey a specimen of the na- tional songs and dances, it was requisite to fetch dancers and bards from a distant island ; schools and churches have taken the places of morals and idols. Were the islands not so scattered and so numerous, the time might not perhaps have been distant when it would have been necessary to study the national manners and customs of the inhabitants of Oceania in museums of antiquities, as we now do those of our own heathen times. The Oceanians display great pleasure in adopting European civilization ; indeed, this delight sometimes borders on enthu- siasm. When the inhabitants of the Sandwich Islands re- marked that, by the aid of writing, it was possible to commu- nicate thought to those at a distance, they were so taken by the idea that everybody, great and small, hastened with his copy-book to the schools, and took them by storm ; similar scenes occurred at the establishment of the first printing-press at Eimeo. Tameamea, who made himself ruler over all the Sandwich Islands, was a Peter the Great for his nation ; he made every effort to diffuse European civilization ; built ships him- self, established a militia, and commenced an independent trade in sandal-wood with China, which, however, did not succeed. There is something very pleasing in seeing how civiliza- tion, and, simultaneously with it, Christianity, diffuses its ad- vantages over many parts of the globe, and what giant strides this progress sometimes makes. But the pleasure arising from this is often disturbed for the philanthropist by an admixture of melancholy considerations ; for the progress of civilization takes place, in most cases, by the Europeans or their successors displacing the older races, who perish as by a slow consumption. The same fate which the Gruanches 108 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. met in the Canary Islands, in all probability awaits the native races of North America, the savage tribes of Brazil, the abo- rigines of New Holland, the northern tribes of Siberia, and the Kamtschatdales. In human eyes it appears more desirable that the noble scion should be grafted on the wild stock, and not that the latter should be cut down to make place for the former. Oceania affords a remarkable and brilliant example of such a grafting. Perhaps it is here as in plants, the stock on which the scion is grafted must be of allied nature. THE TROLLHATTA FALL. 109 CHAPTEE XIV. THE TKOLLHATTA FALL. The importance and the character of a waterfall are prin- cipally determined by three things, namely, the quantity of water, the depth of the fall, and the angle which it forms with the horizon. The last two are easily ascertained by direct measurement ; it is more difficult to determine the quantity of water. It is altered with the seasons and years, and cannot be ascertained from the breadth of the fall, for this does not depend solely on the quantity of water, but also, and indeed principally, upon the form of the earth's surface ; if this be such that the flow of water is compressed between cliffs, the breadth may be much less than in another fall which possesses a far smaller quantity of water. In the absence of actual measurements, therefore, we have to draw conclusions respecting the amount of water from the size of the streams or lakes which flow into the waterfall. We are able, consequently, to obtain a fair idea of the quantity of water at Trollhatta, by directing our attention to the circumference of Lake Venner, which empties its waters into the Cattegat through the Gotha-Elv, which forms the fall ; its size almost equals that of all Zealand, whence the old northern Sagas related that Gefion plucked this island out of the place where the Venner lies, and removed it to the entrance of the Baltic. Lake Venner is fed by a number of large and small streams, but chiefly by Klar-Elv, which rises more than 200 miles off in the mountain-lake of Eaemund. The elevation of Lake Venner above the sea amounts to about 250 feet ; so great, therefore, is the fall from this inland lake to the coast, at a distance of about forty-six miles ; 112 feet of this occur at the Trollhatta, not however in one fall, but in several small ones, which succeed one another so closely that the Elv has not anywhere a quiet current. Highest of all lies the Gullo fall, so called from the inaccessible, fir-covered, rocky islet of Gullo, which lies in the middle of the fall ; next follow the Toppo and Stampe- strom, and the Hollen falls ; lastly, quite at the bottom, the Flottberg-strom, with a slight fall. While the separate 110 THE EAItTII, PLANTS, AND MAN. portions, taken singly, afford a wonderfully beautiful scene, the entire fall also may be very well seen at once from the neighbouring heights. The cliffs which partly enclose the fall, partly project from it, and the fir-woods upon these cliffs, essentially contribute to heighten the beauty of ( the enormous masses of water rushing perpendicularly down, the vast white-foamed waves coursing each other with arrow- like swiftness, and the clouds of vapour which envelope them. Europe has many waterfalls that surpass the Trollhatta in height ; not a few, indeed, several times as high, such as the Marbore fall, near Gavernie in the Pyrenees, which is formed from a gathering of ten or twelve watercourses, one of which makes a leap of some 1300 feet at abound ; Staub-bach, again, in the valley of Lauterbrunnen, the height of which amounts to more than 900 feet ; but these falls are formed by little mountain-brooks falling over steep cliffs, and are either par- tially or wholly dissipated into spray before they reach the bottom of the fall ; these little streaks of silver gliding down the often perpendicular cliffs, have indeed their beauties, especially when the sun shines upon them and forms rain- bows on the rocky sides, but from the smaller amount of water, they are destitute of the grandeur of the Trollhatta fall. Hansteen has made us acquainted with the Borring fall, in the bishopric of Bergen ; its height amounts to 900 feet, and the quantity of water is undoubtedly greater than in those just now mentioned, but hardly very considerable, since the west side of Norway displays but very small streams compared with those which emerge on the east side of the great mountain-chain. There is a very beautiful waterfall at Terni, in the Papal States, the Caduta della Marmore. The river Velino, which rises about fifty miles to the south, having caused great mischief in the surrounding districts, it was diverted by digging a canal through the limestone rocks ; this river, compressed into a narrow bed, forms the fall, rushing down from a height of 300 or 400 feet perpendicularly into a very narrow valley. From an orange-grove in the bottom of the valley there is a picturesque view of this waterfall, surrounded by a luxuriant Italian vegetation. The Biukan- fall (the reeking fall) , in Upper Tellemark, is among the water- falls which combine a very considerable height with a tolerably large quantity of water. The mountain-lake, Mioswasser, THE TBOLLHATTA TALL. Ill which is twenty-five or thirty miles long, and has an average breadth of more than two miles, empties itself into the Maane-Elv, and this forms the waterfall ; at the very top it runs in two very oblique divisions, and below these the water drops almost perpendicularly about 800 feet into a deep abyss, which is so filled with watery vapour that the bottom of the abyss cannot be seen from its upper edge ; the water flows away through a narrow fissure in the rocks. Conse- quently no convenient point exists from whence a view of the fall can be obtained ; it is indeed possible to descend to the foot of the fall, but there the beholder is too close to the fall, and since the cliffs are steep and wet, the descent cannot be accomplished without danger. This waterfall surpasses the Trollhatta in height, but is far inferior in quantity of water. Next to the Trollhatta, in regard to height and quantity of water, come undoubtedly the celebrated Norwegian Sarpen, and the Swiss falls of the Rhine. Sarpen receives not only the Klar-Elv, but the streams of the high mountain-chains of Norway, more than 200 miles to the north, namely, the united waters of Laugen and Glommen (G-uldbrandalen and Osterdalen), which flow, in their way, through the great lakes Mios and Oire ; but in spite of this, the quantity of water is much inferior to that of the Vernier and the Gotha-Elv. The height, sixty feet, is also only about half that of the Trollhatta. TheRhine fallatLaufen,in the neighbourhood of Schaffhausen, is about the same height as SarpeD, namely 50 or 70 feet ; the quantity of water, also, coming from the High Alps and the Lake of Constance is about the same as at the last-named waterfall. It appears, therefore, that if we except those falls which are of inconsiderable height, the Trollhatta must be consi- dered as surpassing all others in Europe in quantity of water. But great as the giant is, he must yield to a mightier when we turn our eyes to other parts of the globe. The Niagara falls, in North America, are formed by the waters of the vast Lakes Superior, Huron, Michigan, and Erie, before the stream empties itself into Lake Ontario, which communicates with the sea through the river St. Lawrence. The size of these lakes amounts to nearly two- 112 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. thirds of that of the Baltic, and is more than forty times as large as Lake Venner. It is to be supposed that the amount of water at Niagara and at Trollhatta stand in a similar pro- portion to each other ; and while, therefore, the Swedish wa- terfall is a giant in comparison with the other European falls, it remains a dwarf beside the North American. In height, also, the Niagara has the advantage, for the fall amounts to 140 or 160 feet. The Trollhatta is not only one of the most remarkable natural phenomena in Europe ; it affords testimony of the force of the human mind, and above all, of science in conflict with nature. Lakes and rivers are important means of communication, but waterfalls prevent it. Thus Trollhatta interrupted the water-communication which would otherwise have existed between the great upland of the Venner and the coast, and thence with other countries. This obstacle was only most imperfectly overcome by the vessels stopping above and below the fall, unloading the merchandize, conveying over- land and re-shipping it. But science gave counsel, and public authority followed the advice. A portion of the water of the river was diverted to the side, above the fall, in a canal partly hewn through the rock, and through a lake lying near, but here it met a steep precipice. Erom below, the masts of the vessels are seen projecting high above the cliff; but art proves able to bring them down. In the hard rock, more than seventy feet high, a deep canal has been cut, in which five locks are placed close together, and below the cliff are three more. When a vessel is to be let down, the upper gate of the highest lock is opened ; the water flows in gradually until it reaches the same height in the lock as it has above, and the vessel can now sail in. The upper gate is then closed, the gate of the next lock opened, and the water flows from the first lock into the second, the vessel sinking slowly till the water is level in both locks, and thus the vessel reaches the second, which is then closed above, and this operation is repeated with all the locks, so as to bring the vessel down to the foot of the waterfall. The same operation, in a re- versed order, lifts the vessel up to the top of the precipice : the lowest gate of the lowest lock being opened to let the water THE TBOLLHATTA TALL. 113 out, it comes to a level with the river ; when the vessel has en- tered, the front gate is closed, and the hack one opened, and the same process is repeated until the summit is reached. Natural science has also facilitated communication in an- other respect here. With sailing vessels the passage is necessarily very slow along the winding river, and the delay is further prolonged by the passage through the locks ; hut steam power is especially adapted for the navigation of rivers. The number of steam-boats between Gothenburg and the inland is continually increasing. But the naturalist has not only to combat nature. He must maintain another conflict, even as science has other cares ; he must take the field against human prejudices, a conflict which is often more difficult and more lasting than the former. Trollhatta reminds me of this conflict. Here, where the cliffs, rivers, and pine-forests of Norway and Swe- den border closely on the plains and beech-groves of Den- mark, I see in memory a great gathering of naturalists col- lected around a frugal but hearty table in a neat wooden building. (The meeting of the northern naturalists at Gothen- burg, July, 1839.) They have come hither from the various regions of Scandinavia ; they are sons of three races, which have carried on bloody strife for centuries, between whom for centuries misunderstanding, mistrust, and rancour, originat- ing in and nourished by national prejudices, have prevailed. But I see them sitting here intermingled, I hear them speak in the same tongue, albeit in different dialects ; they offer the right-hand truly ; men growing in years form brother- hoods, and converse together with the familiar " thou ;" plea- sure and satisfaction beam in every countenance. It is evident that a great common thought animates the whole assembly at this moment : a longing fills the soul, a longing for the coming condition of things, when the strife, the mis- trust of nations shall have ceased, and when this strife and these prejudices shall be regarded with the same eye as that with which we now look back upon the wars of town against town, castle against castle, and house against house, so general during the middle ages, 114 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. CHAPTEE XV. THE PAET PLATED BY FOBESTS IN NATUEE AND IN HUMAN LIFE. Next to the irregularities of the earth's surface and the distribution of land and water, the principal feature contri- buting to mark the physiognomy of countries, is the vegeta- tion. Among the plants again it is the taller, arborescent kinds which by their magnitude play the chief part in cha- racterising the land. A collection of tall arborescent plants, with trunks embranched below, we call a forest, while the terms "bush" and "heath" are applied to assemblages of low woody plants or bushes. The bush is only distinguished from the tree by its sending up a number of stems from the root ; or, more properly speaking, by the stem dividing into several branches close to the root. But Nature affords mani- fold transitions between trees and bushes, and trees may be artificially changed into bushes (limes, hornbeam), and bushes into trees (the whitethorn) . A wood, too, is not always an assemblage of trees ; it may be a single tree. The banyan- tree (Metis indica) of India has the peculiarity of sending down branches to the earth, where they strike root and grow into new trunks, which maintain their connexion with the parent. According to Forbes, there exists near the river Nerbuddah, in India, a wood formed of a single tree ; in this there are 350 large and more than 3000 small stems, all con- nected together, and covering an area of 2000 feet. An army of 7000 men has rested beneath its shade. The mangrove (Mhizophora) exhibits something similar, a plant playing an important part in the coast-swamps of tropical countries ; this also sends down branches, which again give off stems, and in this way form an intricate wood, well fitted for the abode of crocodiles and snakes. Certain climatal conditions are requisite for the growth of trees ; there exist portions of the earth's surface which are destitute of woods, chiefly on account of the cold. The tree- limit illustrates this. "When we investigate this limit in the Northern Polar countries, we find that it is met with in the most northern CHAEACTEES AND INFLUENCE OF FOEESTS. 115 region of Scandinavia, about 70° or 71° N. L. (it is formed by the birch ; the Scotch fir and Norway spruce extend only to 67° and 69°) ; here, however, trees grow only in the fiords, not close upon the sea, and from hence the tree- limit recedes both towards the east, and, still more, towards the west. Iceland, the Feroe Islands, and Greenland, are destitute of woods, although the south extremity of the last- named country lies in the latitude of 60°, and the most southern part of the others at 63-J- and 61^°. On the west coast of America the tree-limit recedes still farther to the south, for in Labrador the trees do not go further north than 58°. But the line which marks the tree-limit advances in the interior of North America ; for Franklin found a pine (JPinus alba) on the Coppermine river at 68° — 69°, in spite of the excessive cold ; in Siberia, a larch (Larix sibiricd) ad- vances far to the north, in spite of the low degree of cold, for it is met with up to 68°. On the other hand, the tree-limit recedes greatly in Eastern Siberia ; still more in Kamtschatka, where the growth of trees ceases at about 58° ; on the north- west coast of America it extends somewhat further up. Thus the line of the tree-limit has two polar curves and two equatorial curves, but, remarkably enough, these stand in contrast to the curves of the lines of heat, for exactly there where the mean temperature is lowest, do the trees go furthest towards the north (in the interior of both countries), and where the mean temperature is highest (on the two seas) the line recedes towards the south. Therefore, it is evidently not the mean temperature which determines the occurrence of trees, but partly the summer heat, which is ordinarily some- what higher in the interior of continents than on the coasts, — partly the more changeable climate and more violent storms which occur in the coast countries, — and finally, partly the saline particles in the currents of air, which act inju- riously upon the vegetation of trees. In the southern hemisphere the trees extend as far towards the south pole as the continents ; trees are, indeed, absent from the extreme point of Cape Horn, but Tierra del Fuego has forests of large beeches. The islands lying in the vast ocean to the south of the continents are destitute of wood. Not only does the vicinity of the pole set a limit to the growth of trees, the height of mountains has the same effect. i2 116 THE EA.BTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. There is a tree-liinit also in the vertical direction. Thus the growth of trees ceases at an elevation of 500 feet in Lapland (the birch) ; at 3500 feet (also the birch) in the south of Norway ; in the Alps, at 6000 feet (the larch and dwarf fir) ; and on the Andes, at about 12,000 feet. But, besides the Polar countries and the higher zones of mountains, there are vast tracts of the earth's surface within the tree-limits which are devoid of woods. Among these may especially be cited : 1. The Desert Zone of Africa, from Atlas and the Mediter- ranean Sea to the highlands southward of the upper part of the course of the Niger and Lake Tschad, 15° ; from the Atlantic Ocean to the Bed Sea ; for Egypt and Nubia also belong to this ; nay, the whole of Arabia may be included, the greater part of Persia, and the north-western provinces of India — namely, the lower part of the course of the Indus : an enormous tract, perhaps not inferior in extent to the whole of Europe. 2. The Salt Steppes, eastward, northward, and westward of the Caspian Sea and Lake Aral ; they extend even into the southern part of European Bussia, which is likewise without woods. 3. Mongolia and Tibet, where partly the elevation and partly the character of the soil likewise cause a total absence of woods. 4. The vast Prairies of the Missouri and the Mississippi. The savannahs of Florida are also among the unwooded parts of North America. 5. The great plateaux in the northern provinces of Mexico. 6. The steppes or Llanos, as they are called, on the Orinoco. 7. The enormous bare plains of the region of the river Plata, the Pampas, which extend from the Cordilleras of Chili to the Atlantic Ocean, from the mountain-chains of Brazil to the Straits of Magelhaen ; for the whole of Patagonia is devoid of wood. In the frontispiece-map are represented the wooded portions of the earth, but it is self-evident that many smaller un- wooded portions exist within the limits of these regions (for example, the west coast of Jutland, the elevated region of Spain, &c.) "We shall, perhaps, best obtain a general view of the dif- CHABACTEE3 AND INFLUENCE OF FOBESTS. 117 ferent characters of the woods, by examining the zones indi- cated on the map : 1. The Zone of the Conifers. — The coniferous trees are in general characterised by their slender trunks, which in some species of the north-west coast of America, attain a height of 200 and 250 feet, and by the narrow, dry, needle-shaped leaves, which are evergreen, with the exception of the larch, so that they maintain the appearance of vegetation throughout the year, in a zone where all traces of other vegetation vanish in winter. The thickly rising trunks do not readily admit of the growth of other trees in the forests where Conifers prevail ; but the birch is mingled with them not unfrequently, The vegetation beneath the Conifers is very stunted, which is especially the ease in the fir-woods ; the dense shade and the ordinarily not very fertile soil which the Conifers prefer, and the fallen leaves, are certainly to be regarded as the principal causes. Yet we find some of the Ericaceous family (JRhodo- dendra, Pyrolce, <&c), and a few fungi, on the soil of the coniferous woods ; the beard-like lichens ( Usiieace) hang from the branches of these trees. In Northern Europe these coniferous trees form the forests : the Scotch fir, the Norway spruce, and the larch (the yew-tree occurs sparingly, not forming woods). Northern Asia in like manner produces but few species in its great wooded zone. Great uniformity consequently prevails in the northern countries of the old continent. The coniferous woods of North America display a far greater multiformity, for already thirty or forty species of them are known. 2. The Zone of the Amentaceous, or Catkin-bearing trees. — While the Conifers have a tendency to rise high without exhibiting a corresponding circumference, the Amentaceous trees spread out their ordinarily more diffuse branches very far to the sides. The leaves are usually broad and tender, so that both they and the branches and twigs are more mobile in the wind, which gives them a charm wanting in the rigid Conifers. But the leaves fall, and leave the trunk naked during the winter. The trunks themselves here usually acquire a greater thickness than those of the Conifers (for example, in the oak, beech, chestnut, and plane). They agree with the Conifers in the flowers being small, uncoloured, and destitute of beauty. The variety is greater here than in the 118 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. Conifers, but in this respect again North America has the advantage, especially through its numerous kinds of oak. The deciduous trees suffer the presence of many plants beneath their expanded arms ; in particular, we meet with a beautiful spring flora, before the leaves have unfolded. Conifers occur in the zone of the Catkin-bearing trees, as do, in like manner, the latter in the zone of the Conifers ; but the division is here drawn according to the prevailing trees. In the warmer part of the temperate zone, in Europe and North Africa, is seen the transition from the zone of the Catkin-bearing trees to the tropical zone. Here, various of these trees retain their leaves through the winter, as the ilex and cork oak ; families of plants which appear only as herbs in the colder zone, here show themselves as tall shrubs or trees, as the leguminous plants and mallows ; and tropical families, such as those of the laurels and palms, have a few representatives here. The variety becomes greater, and beautiful blossoms decorate a portion of the trees. A similar condition is seen in the southern districts of North America, where the magnolias appear, with their broad, shining leaves and large splendid flowers, and the gleditschias and robinias, with their feathered leaves and elegant blossoms. 3. The Zone of 'the Multiform Woods. — The especial char- acteristic of this zone, the greater portion of which lies within the tropics, is the extraordinary variety of the trees. While our woods are composed of one or of a few kinds, in the torrid zone they are formed of several hundred species of trees ; thus a single region on the mountains of Java displays a hundred species of fig, besides many other trees. "While in the temperate zone firs or pines, beeches or chestnuts, meet the eye unceasingly over great tracts of country, in the torrid zone palms and mimosas, to select two examples out of many, present new specific forms at a very short distance. But this very variety renders it difficult to give a summary, even merely of the principal forms. I will name only the fol- lowing: — The palms, with their lofty, undivided trunks, with leaves, flowers, and fruits at the summit, and usually rising high above the leafy trees ; the mimosas, and other legumi- nous trees, with very compound leaves, and frequently splendid blossoms (Amherstia nobilis) ; the mallow tribe, with their thick trunks {Baobab), with broad, usually divided CHARACTERS AND INFLUENCE OF FORESTS. 119 leaves, and large, handsome flowers (Carolined) ; trees of the family of the Euphorbia, which contain milky juice, some- times poisonous, sometimes, as an Euphorbia balswmifera, drinkable like the milk of animals ; trees of the fig family, with large shining leaves, also with milky juice. Trees of the laurel family, with leathery, glossy leaves, and aromatic products ; the arborescent ferns, with their lovely, finely- divided foliage at the summit ; the Oycads, with large leaves, often subdivided on each side like the teeth of a comb, crowning the tesselated trunk. The tropical forests are characterised in the next place by the size of the individuals, for although examples occur in the temperate zone of very lofty trees, for instance, species of fir, taken altogether, the trees of the torrid zone are higher than those of the temperate zone ; further, by their large per- sistent leaves (in the Catingas forests of Brazil, they are deciduous), by large flowers and fruits (Lodoicea maldwicd). Moreover, abundance of climbing plants is among the charac- teristic features of the tropical forests. These (the Lianes, as they are called ; for example, species of Cissus, Banisteria, Bignonia, Passiflora, &c), themselves arborescent, twine round the trunks, and frequently acquire such a mastery as to choke them, and at length wind round bare, dead cy- linders. They often seem to have compressed the trunks like snakes, which arises from the bark and wood having' grown up over these climbers ; frequently they hang like garlands from one trunk to another, or (for example, the Eotangs, Calamem, Spanish cane) they twine to a length of several hundred feet, like a cord from tree to tree; and since the trunks of these trees stand very close together, it is only possible to make a way through such a forest, by hewing a path. The number of parasitical plants is another characteristic of tropical forests, in part true parasites, which send their roots into other stems, and derive nourishment from their sap, like the species of Loranihus, — in part false parasites, which grow upon the branches and trunks of trees, but emit air-roots, and are nourished by the moisture they absorb through these from the atmosphere, and by that which they find in the cavities of the trunks. Among these the principal are the extraordinarily numerous family of the 120 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. Orchids, remarkable for their magnificent, peculiarly formed flowers ; also the Pothos family, with broad, often hand- shaped leaves, and flowers upon thick, fleshy clubs ; the pep- per-plants, and the climbing ferns. These various forms frequently clothe a tree in such a manner, that it may be said to bear a flower-garden, where hundreds of different plants form a medley, in which even the practised eye has difficulty in referring each organ to its proper plant. In tropical forests the bamboo-canes are also met with — those woody grasses, which by their drooping shoots and bright-green leaves form a contrast to the usually dark leaves and widely spread branches of the tropical trees. In the tropical forests, therefore, we find a much greater abundance, a much greater mass of plants, than outside the tropics. The high degree of temperature and the great moisture produce a rapid variation, and the decomposed vegetable matters are heaped in layer upon layer on the soil of the forest. This picture is especially applicable to the primaeval fruits, as they are called, in Brazil, Java, and several other regions, where heat and moisture call forth the greatest fulness of vegetation. But if we ascend to a considerable elevation in the torrid zone, the forests change with the altered climate ; the forms of the temperate zone, and at the same time the want of variety and abundance, are again found. On the mountains of Mexico are found many oaks and coniferous trees. At a considerable elevation in Java grow many oaks and several chestnuts ; and on the heights of the Himalayas are seen several Conifers, and other extra-tropical forms. 4. The Zone of the Rigid-leaved Woods. — Turning to the southern hemisphere outside the tropic, we meet, especially in New Holland and Van Diemen's Land, with a most pecu- liar character of the woods. In the two countries last named there exists an extraordinary number of kinds of trees, and yet in spite of this the greatest uniformity, because the trees belong to certain principal forms, the species of which differ little from each other, and because almost all have in common certain peculiarities in the leaves ; these, namely, are dry, leathery, very often evergreen, of a bluish or greyish green colour, and in trees stand vertically upon the shoots. Prom OHABACTEBS AND INFLUENCE OF FOEESTS. 121 this it may readily be concluded, that the woods afford less shade, and possess a dry, dead aspect, although the trees fre- quently hear beautiful flowers. That which characterizes New Holland, holds good also of South Africa. Wherever woods do appear (for in some parts they are infrequent), they are chiefly composed of Proteacese and Ericaceae, with rigid leaves. It is otherwise in the tem- perate part of South America. On the east side, as already observed, there are no woods ; but on the west, in Chili, the tropical forms extend southward of the tropic, and in the southern regions and in Tierra del Euego, they gradually give place to forms resembling the European, for example, beeches. When we investigate the influence of forests upon the atmosphere, we find the most evident signs of it in the torrid zone. The forests increase the rain and moisture, and pro- duce springs and running streams. Tracts destitute of woods become very strongly heated, the air above them ascends per- pendicularly, and thus prevents the clouds from sinking ; and the constant winds (trade-winds or monsoons), when they can blow uninterruptedly over large surfaces, do not allow the transition of vapours into the form of drops. In the forests, on the contrary, the clothed soil does not become so heated, and, besides, the evaporation from the trees favours cooling ; therefore, when the currents of air loaded with vapour reach the forests, they meet with that which con- denses them, and change into rains. Since, moreover, the evaporation of the earth goes on more slowly beneath the trees, and since these also evaporate very copiously in a hot climate, the atmosphere in these forests has a high degree of humidity, this great humidity at the same time producing many springs and streams. Since, then, the forests actually exert this influence in an important degree, and it is deficient when they are absent, sad effects have been experienced in many places which have been robbed of their rain, moisture, springs, and streams, so important to vegetation, by the destruction of the forests. "When the Canary Islands were discovered, they were thickly overgrown with wood ; since these have been gradually almost entirely eradicated, the climate has become very dry, nay, in in some islands — for example, Euerta Ventura, to such a 122 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. degree, that the inhabitants are sometimes obliged to flee to other islands to avoid perishing from thirst. A similar aridity of the climate, produced by the destruction of the forests, has been observed in the Cape de Verd Islands, various of the Antilles, and several other places. In reference to the temperate climates, too, it has been asserted that forests favour rain and moisture, and that a dryness of climate is produced by their extirpation. Many forest-guardians and statesmen have on this account violently opposed too great a consumption of the forests. But it seems to me that the fear which many cherish on this ac- count, is without sufficient ground, and that such an influence, if not totally deniable, is but very slight in all the forests of temperate climates. If we compare the distribution of rain in Europe (the only part of the globe upon which we possess a sufficient number of observations), we see that the mountains and the ocean are the two great causes which influence the quantity of rain and the humidity, and these causes promote them. As we ascend from the plains towards the mountains, the quantity of rain increases considerably, especially on the side of the mountain which lies exposed to the rainy point of the compass (the south-west in most places in Europe). The quantity of rain increases in like manner, albeit in a slighter degree, toward the ocean ; where these two influences (moun- tain and ocean) are combined, the quantity of rain some- times rises to four or five times the usual amount, as on the west coasts of Norway and Britain, the coast of Portugal, and the south side of the Alps, especially next the Adriatic Sea. On the other hand, we cannot trace any notable in- fluence of the forests. Places which lie in the well-wooded north of Germany, have not a greater amount of rain than those in districts devoid of forests, and are inferior in regard to the quantity of rain to the naked plains of Holland. Stock- holm and Upsal, lying in such a richly wooded region, have a smaller quantity of rain than Copenhagen, &c. In the next place, the slight influence of forests in this respect is proved by the comparison of the measurements of rain at various periods in districts where the forests have been cleared away. Great lamentation has been made in Denmark concerning the decrease of the forests, caused partly CHABAOTEES AND INFLUENCE OF FOEESTS. 123 through the subdivision of landed property, partly through the unhappy condition of the country people during the wars of 1807-181Ji, which drove them to the felling of the wood as a means of saving themselves from destruction ; it has been sup- posed that this diminution of the forests has lessened the rain and the quantity of water. But observations of the rain in Co- penhagen of the last third of the last century gave about twenty Paris inches; observations in the present century, twenty- two Paris inches. In London the quantity of rain has remained unaltered since the middle of the last century, in spite of the increasing cultivation of the land diminishing the woods. The same is true of Paris ; indeed, observations of the con- clusion of the 17th and commencement of the 18th centuries seem even to indicate that the quantity of rain was less at that time than at present, and yet the forests of Prance suffered greatly towards the conclusion of the last and the commencement of this century, through the sale of domains and church property, and through the division of large estates, especially during the revolution. At Viviers, in the south of Prance, the amount of rain has increased in the period froml777tol818from thirty-one to thirty-seven inches,inspite of the large forests in the neighbourhood having been almost wholly destroyed. The same holds good in Italy ; while the state economists are actively opposing the extirpation of the forests in the Alps of Lombardy, the quantity of rain has re- mained unchanged in Milan, or even increased a little, in the seventy years from 1764 to 1831. It is easily comprehensible, however, that forests of the temperate zone cannot possess the same influences as those within the tropics, for neither the heating nor cooling are so strong ; and for Europe in particular, the true sources of rain are the prevailing westerly gales from the Atlantic Ocean, and the masses of vapour which theBe bring from the wide ocean are so great, that those which rise from the damp soil in the small area of the forests and from the trees themselves, can be reckoned as nothing compared with them. To this must be added, the variability of the wind, and the conflict between the vapour-loaded, warm south-west and the cold north-east, providing constant opportunities for the change of the vapours into the form of drops. "What has been said of the humidity holds good also of the 124 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. temperature. In the torrid zone, the forests, as a rule, act in diminishing the heat ; in the temperate zone this influence is lost, or only slight, for no striking difference can be observed between the temperature of forest regions and unwooded tracts ; and taken as a whole, the temperature has remained unchanged in Europe during the last centuries, while the forests have been much reduced in size. The ideas of the rigid climate of Germany and France, in the time of the Romans, on account of the greater extent of the forests, are certainly exaggerated, and have arisen from the unfavourable light in which the South Europeans regard the climate of Northern Europe. The theoretical opinion that the climate of North America has been rendered milder by the felling of its forests, does not appear to be confirmed by experience. It cannot be denied that the forests influence the condition of the winds ; but this effect is ordinarily confined to small tracts. On open plains the winds have freer play than in wooded regions. A forest lying to the north may, in Europe, shelter the immediate vicinity from the cold northerly winds, and thus soften the climate ; a forest situated on the south may keep off the warm and damp winds ; a plain in Northern Europe is less exposed to the injurious effects of the maritime winds, when it is protected by a forest lying between it and the sea. In the torrid zone a forest may intercept the cool- ing and wholesome sea-breezes ; then the inner country, especially if swampy, becomes unhealth}-. This is the case with the great mangrove woods in Guinea and Java, and with the primaeval forests on the flooded banks of the river Amazon. No other class of animals is connected so closely with the vegetable kingdom as insects ; very many of them are not only destined to feed upon vegetables, but even upon certain definite species or genera of plants. From this it will readily be con- cluded that forests are of great importance to insects. Myriads of these little animals live upon and in the trunks of trees, upon their leaves, flowers, fruits, and upon their parasitical plants ; myriads of others live upon the vegetable feeders ; countless musquitoes, and other blood-sucking insects, swarm in the dense primaeval forests, and render a sojourn in them almost insupportable. In the temperate zones the number of in- sects is smaller, but nevertheless large enough, so that par- CHAEACTEES AND INFLUENCE OF EOEESTS. 125 ticular species of insects sometimes destroy great tracts of forest ; for example, those which bore into the trunks of the coniferous trees, or eat off their buds, as the species of Bos- trichus, in the Hartz, and the Bombyoc Monacha. Next in importance in the forests to the insect world is the feathered tribe. The climbing-birds, especially fitted by the structure of their feet to live upon trees, are particularly numerous among the winged inhabitants of the forests ; in the torrid zone the great tribe of parrots are the chief of those which make their dwelling in the woods, scarcely ever de- scending to the ground, numerous in individuals, and filling the forests with their disagreeable cries ; in the forests of the temperate zone, the woodpeckers are the chief of the climbers which inhabit the woods, the grubs which they find in the trunks of the trees forming their food ; but very many of the family of song-birds have their home here. The class of reptiles is less abundant and less connected with the forests, but in the torrid zone a great number of snakes have their abode in them, and in the swampy forests of the coasts are found abundance both of snakes and croco- diles, with other lizards. Just as the birds have a peculiar forest-family in the par- rots, the Mammalia have one in the monkeys, the numerous species and individuals of which are so well adapted for a life in the woods ; the structure of their bodies and their food bind them to the trees to such a degree that they seldom or never leave them. Among the other mammals, some of the beasts of prey and animals of the deer-family are especial in- habitants of forests. Turning our attention, lastly, to the human race, we see that nations in the lowest stage of development are some- tunes closely connected with the forests. In the colder lands, where the trees ordinarily bear no edible, or at least no well- flavoured or nourishing fruits, it is the game which chiefly furnishes the inhabitants with food and clothing ; these races then appear chiefly as hunters, such as the aborigines of North America. In the torrid zone, on the contrary, races in the same stage of culture live principally upon the fruits of the trees or the pith of the trunks, like some of the tribes of Brazil, some of the inhabitants of the Indian Archipelago, and several races of negroes. South America even affords 126 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. an example of a race who, almost like monkeys, live upon the trees ; whose existence, in fact, is to a great extent bound to a certain species of tree. There are the Gruarauni, at the mouth of the Orinoco, who live by and upon the Mauritia palm. "While the ground is flooded, mats woven from the leaf-stalks of those palms are suspended between the trunks ; these mats are covered with clay, so that fires can be made upon them, and here the Guarauni sleep, and pass a great portion of their lives. The trunk furnishes a fecula ; the juice, a palm-wine ; and the fruits are well-flavoured, mealy at first, and afterwards sweet. Nomadic races, on the other hand, generally avoid forests ; extensive grazing plains, fertile vallej's, or the slopes of mountains, aifording rich pasture-land, are the best fitted for the migratory life which they lead, and for the support of their domestic animals. As soon as a race rises to agriculture, it becomes hostile to the forests. The trees are in the way of the spade and plough, and the wood gives less booty than the field, the garden, or the vineyard. The forest, therefore, falls beneath the axe, fire consumes the fallen trunks and branches, and the ashes manure the soil, giving for some years an extra- ordinarily rich harvest, especially in the dense tropical pri- maeval forests. When, after the lapse of some years, the fertility decreases, a new portion of the wood is felled and burnt, and thus man proceeds unsparingly with the destruc- tion of the forests ; sometimes the conflagration spreads further than was intended, and the destruction is thus in- creased. This is the course pursued by the peasants of Norway and Sweden, as also by the colonists of North America, of Brazil, Mexico, the Cape, Java, and in every place where agriculture first appears, or commences its first constant and uninterrupted extension. With the increase of population this destruction of the forests is continued, for it brings with it increased consump- tion of the products of the forest ; wood is required for houses, furniture, wagons, and other implements, for bridges, posts, for fences, fuel for cooking, and where the climate is cold, for warming the dwellings. The consumption of wood increases further with industry, with navigation and trade. Mining operations require CHABACTEBS AND INFLUENCE OF FORESTS. 127 timber, both, for the works and for fuel to smelt the metals and ores ; artizans and manufacturers use large quantities of the products of forests ; dams against rivers and seas require their share, but, above all, navigation. The trunks of millions of trees are used up in ships and masts, in order to connect the highlands and inland districts with the coasts, and the coasts with each other, even beyond the ocean. In this way civilisation comes into hostile contact with the forests, and thus, under like circumstances, the country in which civilisation is oldest, possesses the fewest woods. Hence forests are more sparingly met with in the countries of the Mediterranean than northward of the Alps, and more sparingly in the centre than in the north of Europe, so far as the climate is not an obstacle to the growth of timber. Have not, then, our descendants to expect a great de- ficiency of timber — a deficiency which may readily become disastrous ? Many public economists and philanthropists have assumed this to be the case, and many do still assume it ; they depict the future destitution of timber in the darkest colours, they loudly complain of the felling of wood, and they demand that governments should prevent in time the ruinous consequences, by limiting the free use of wooded estates. Tet even as I have striven to demonstrate the groundless- ness of the idea of the danger which is feared of alteration of climate, by the diminution of the forests in temperate countries, I hope also to be able in some measure to scatter the dark cloud which so many imagine they see hanging over future generations in regard to the product of forests. That which is true of so many other inconveniences following in the train of civilisation, holds also with this. It has its cure, in a great measure, in itself. In the first place, it is clear that as wood becomes more scarce, and thereby dearer, other materials come into use in its stead. While in Norway, Sweden, and the north of Eussia, houses are built of wood alone, they are built of stone and wood in Central Europe, and almost entirely of stone in the south of Europe. While in the north the fields are fenced with wooden posts, living hedges or stone walls are used in Central Europe ; while gardens are surrounded by palings 128 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. ■with us, walls are used in the south of Europe The wooden bridges and timber dams of the north are changed for stone bridges and quays of masonry in the south. For the want of other fuel, the South European uses the trees on which he trains his vines, or the old olive-trees. Bridges, ships, nay, even houses, are built of iron. Coal and peat, when these are at hand or can be procured, take the place of firewood when this becomes too dear. Secondly, it is clear that as wood gradually becomes dearer, it is used more sparingly. In Norway and Sweden firewood and timber are lavished in a way which is unknown in Den- mark ; if we compare the consumption of firewood in the country with that in towns, we are tempted to accuse the rural population of wastefulness. And yet there is no doubt that even in the towns we could save fuel by well- contrived stoves and heating apparatus, without losing heat. Thirdly, it is certain that increase of civilization widens the market ; if timber is absent in one country, it is fetched from another ; the more facile means of intercommunication lower the price. The greatest commercial and maritime State fetches its timber and its masts from Scandinavia, from the countries of the Baltic ; nay, even from the other side of the Atlantic. Fourthly, the increasing price which the decreasing extent of the forests involves, becomes an inducement to preserve them, to maintain them, and at least to raise new woods in those places where the soil is not adapted for agriculture. Instead of allowing domestic animals to graze in the woods and destroy the young growth, the woods are fenced in and the cattle kept out. Wild animals are kept in zoological gardens. The forests are treated according to a scientific plan ; trees are felled according to a definite rule, and young plantations are provided. The diminution of the forests has called into existence the entire science and practice of forestry in Europe. During the war-time of 1807-1814, it was greatly feared in Denmark that fuel would fail ; and it is certain that many woods were felled both during the war and in the imme- diately succeeding period, since the country people, reduced to poverty by the forestalling, were compelled to seek relief CHABA.CTEES A.ND INFLUENCE OF FOEESTS. 129 in the sale of their woods. Nevertheless these destructions of forests do not appear to have had the effect that was feared. In the earliest years of this century, before the war com- menced, a fathom of firewood cost, in Copenhagen, about 11. 5s. 6d. ; at present it costs, on an average, 11. to 11. Is. 6d., although there is at present a duty which did not then exist. The wood of an unfelled tree cost, before that era, 13s. 6d. in Zealand, which is also above the present ordinary price. The forests are indeed diminished, but they are protected and better treated, and firewood is more sparingly used than formerly. The State has therefore gained, and no one has been a loser by the change. 130 THE EAKTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. CHAPTEE XVI. THE GEOGBAPHT. OF THE BEEAD-PLANTS. ~We call those bread-plants which contain in one or more parts of the structure a sufficient abundance of starch to furnish an essential article of food to man. The starch, or fecula, is that material which constitutes the principal mass of bread, although other substances usually occurring with it, gluten and vegetable albumen, play an important part in regard to nutrition in a stricter sense, especially to the for- mation of muscle. Starch consists of whitish transparent granules, composed of thin layers, and of various forms and sizes, which lie inside the cells of plants, and are coloured blue by a solution of iodine, while the membrane of the cell usually remain un- coloured. In the potato, which has uncommonly large granules, they acquire a diameter of -^ of a line. The starch, or mealy substance, occurs sometimes in the cotyledons, that is, the leaf-like parts which enclose the germ before the seed is developed, for example, in beans, peas, nuts, walnuts, chestnuts, horse-chestnuts, &c. ; some- times in the albuminous mass, the part which encloses the entire germ, within the coats of the seed, for example in the various kinds of grain, the buckwheat, and the cocoa-nut ;* sometimes in the envelope of the seed (the fruit), for example, in the bread-fruit, the banana, the date, and the St. John's bread ; sometimes in the interior of the stem (as sago), for example, in several palms, Cycads, and ferns ; lastly, some- times in tubers, which may be portions of the root or of sub- terraneous stems, for example, yams, cassava, salep, sweet potatoes, potatoes, Jerusalem artichokes, &c. Starchy matter does not occur in the leaves and flowers, at least not in such quantity as to be capable of affording a bread-stuff. There are countries with such unfavourable climatal con- ditions that they cannot produce any bread-plant, among others, the North Polar lands. Here dried fish principally takes the place of bread, and, combined with fresh fish and marine mammals, constitutes almost the sole food. "We can (* An error a ; fixed oil takes the place of the starch in the cocoa-nut. — Ed.) THE GEOGEAPHY OP THE BEE AD-PLANTS. 131 imagine a line separating these regions from the bread- countries, and this line may be called the Bread-line. This does not by any means run parallel with the circles of latitude, but makes considerable curves toward the pole and equator. The Bread-line extends furthest north in Scandinavia, for in Einmark we meet, only within the fiords, it is true, with barley and potatoes up to the 70° N. L. ; from here it sinks both to the east and west. It is well known that neither Iceland nor Greenland possess bread-plants, although the south coast of the former lies iu 63^°, and that of the latter in 60° N. L. ; and that in the Eeroe Islands, although lying between 61 \° and 62^°, there exists but an inconsiderable cultivation of barley. On the east side of North America, the Bread-line sinks still further to the south, for Newfound- land and Labrador have no bread-plants, and the limit can scarcely be put here higher than 50°, consequently much further south than in Denmark, where the plains abound in corn. It extends a little further north on the western coast of North America, which, as is well known, possesses a warmer climate than the east side ; the few data which we find here, render the determination of the north limit ra- ther uncertain ; it can scarcely be placed higher than 57° or 58°. Turning from Scandinavia towards the east, we find a depression of the Bread-line, even in European Russia, here coming by 67° northward of Archangel ; the curve is con- siderable in Asiatic Eussia, at Ob the north limit of bread comes to 60°, at Jenesei to 58°, at Lena 57-^°, and in Kam- tschatka, which has only a slight cultivation of corn in the most southern part, it sinks to 51°, thus about to the same latitude as on the east coast of North America. The Bread- line has thus two polar and two equatorial curves, the former corresponding to the western, the latter to the eastern sides of the continents. Toward the south pole, there exists so little land, and this is so sparingly cultivated, that the Bread-line cannot be drawn with certainty there. Everything indicates that the curvatures are much slighter. The portion of the solid surface of the globe which lies within the Bread-limits, may be divided into several zones according to the prevailing bread-plant, but it is better to define them separately for the different longitudinal zones. In the western part of the old world (Europe and Africa), k2 132 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. we can distinguish sis zones, succeeding one another from north to south ; but it must be observed here that these limits are by no means so sharply defined in nature as on the map, and that the predominant bread-plant of one zone occurs frequently also, although subordinate, in the others. 1 . The Zone of Barley, Oats, and the Potato, includes that part of Scandinavia which borders on the Bread-line ; that is to say, Einmark, Nordland, and the higher districts of the Scandinavian mountains, the Feroe Islands, the Shetlands, the most northern part of Scotland and Ireland. Bread is made of barley or oats, or of a mixture of the two ; potatoes constitute an important food. The north and south limits of this zone may be determined according to the varying distances from the sea. North boundary, 62°— 70°— 67° N. L. South boundary, 57°*— 65°— 60° N. L. 2. The Zone of Eye occupies the greater part of Europe north of the Alps, but with the exception of the west side, for in England and Erance wheat is the predominant bread- stuff, and the zone of wheat thus immediately adjoins here that of barley and oats. In the zone of rye, buckwheat, beans, and peas, are also important farinaceous food ; in the east, moreover, the millet is considerably used. The cultiva- tion of wheat and the use of wheaten bread increase in this zone as we proceed southward. The boundaries of the Zone of Eye may be placed at the east side of Europe at about : North boundary, 65°— 60° N. L. South boundary, 50°— 48° N. L. It must be observed, however, that the Zone of Eye is found in the centre of Europe and southward of 50°, on ac- count of the elevation of the countries. Barley is chiefly used for beer in this zone, which is destitute of the vine ; oats are used for the food of horses. 3. The Zone of Wheat extends from the above-mentioned boundary of the Zone of Eye (in the west, of the Barley and Oats Zone) to the African desert ; consequently, from west to east in Europe and the north of Africa. North boundary, 57°— 50°— 48° N. L. South boundary, 30° N. L. * In Scotland; in Ireland, 52°. THE GEOGRAPHY OF THE BREAD-PLANTS. 133 This zone, therefore, includes, besides Great Britain and France, the whole of Southern Europe and the north of Africa. In this zone, in the middle of the northern boun- dary (50°), maize already plays a not unimportant part, and from 45° rice also ; but they are usually confined to certain regions, and subordinate to the wheat. Beans, lentils, and several pulses, as well as millet, and in some districts (espe- cially Egypt) durra, are of some importance as articles of food. Barley is not used for beer here, but chiefly for the food of horses and mules. In the mountain regions of this zone rye sometimes appears predominant ; in some parts chestnuts form the principal farinaceous food. 4. The Zone of the Date adjoins the African deserts be- tween 30° and 15° N. L. The greater part is destitute of bread-plants ; dates, however, constitute the principal food in the oases. But wheat and several other kinds of grain are also cultivated here. North boundary, 30° N. L. South boundary, 15° N. L. 5. The Tropical Zone. — Bice and maize are the grains chiefly used here, but other bread-plants play an important part, especially yams, mandioc (cassava), and the plantain. It includes both the west and east coasts of Africa, from the deserts to the southern tropic ; the interior is little known, but so far as it is, the same appears to hold good, excepting in the case of Abyssinia, where the conditions are somewhat altered, on account of the elevation. North boundary, 15° N. L. South boundary, 23° S. L. 6. The Southern Zone of WJieat.—In the south of Africa, especially in the Cape Colony, the European grains again make their appearance ; wheat is predominant. North boundary, 23° S. L. South boundary, 35° S. L. Eor the eastern portion of the Old World (Asia), as well as for New Holland, the following zones may be laid down, but they are greatly modified by the great Asiatic mountain regions. 134 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. 1. The Zone of Barley, Oats, and Bye, which goes from the Bread-line to about 50° in the west, and to 40° in the east of Asia. Besides the grains named, buckwheat and potatoes, especially the former, are cultivated to a considerable ex- tent. North boundary, 60°— 51° 1ST. L. South boundary, 50°— 40° N. L. 2. The Zone of Wheat in the west and Bice in the east. — In the west of Asia, between 50° N. L. and the tropic, wheat' prevails. In the east, on the other hand, the cultivation of rice extends to the south limit of the preceding zone ; wheat, indeed, occurs also, but not in sufficient extent to form a zone.' In the middle of the continent there is but little agri- culture in the dry and sterile plateaux and mountains. The limits therefore are : The Zone of Wheat. The Zone of Eice. North boundary, 50°. 40° N. L. South boundary, 23° N. L. 3. The Tropical Zone. — The predominant bread-stuff is rice ; but the yam, plantain, and cocoa-nut, also bear an important share ; and with regard to the Archipelago between Asia and New Holland (Polynesia), the sago-plants, the bread- fruit tree and the cocoa-nut palm divide the predominance with rice. North boundary, 23° N. L. South boundary, 23° S. L. 4. The Southern Zone of Wheat occurs only in the Euro- pean colonies, in New Holland and Van Dieman's Land, where also the other European grains are cultivated. North boundary, 23° S. L. South boundary, 44° S. L. For the Islands of the South Sea (Oceania). 1. The Zone of the Bread-fruit and Cocoa-nut Palm in- cludes the islands within the tropics. Taro (Colocasia escu- lentd) is also general here. North boundary, 23° N. L. South boundary, 23° S. L. THE GEOGRAPHY OF THE BEEAD-PLANTS. 135 2. The inhabitants of New Zealand have hitherto used only Fern-stems as sources of farinaceous food. North boundary, 34° S. L. South boundary, 48° 8. L. In regard to America, the zones may be found in the fol- lowing manner : 1. The Zone of Bye, Barley, and Oats, as well as Potatoes. No special zone of Eye can be distinguished here. Western. Eastern. North boundary, 58°. 50° N. L. South boundary, 50°. 45° N. L. 2. The Zone of Wheat. — Although, taken altogether, wheat predominates here, maize occurs very frequently from 45°, and in Carolina rice even takes the place of wheat. North boundary, 50°— 45° N. L. South boundary, 30° N. L. 3. The Tropical Zone. — The predominant grain is maize, bat the yam, sweet potato, cassava, and plantain, play a very important part, to which may be added arrow-root ( Maranta arundinacea) , chayote (Sechium edule), &c. ; in Brazil, rice is universal. North boundary, 30° N. L. South boundary, 23° S. L. 4. The Southern Zone of Wheat and other European grains. North boundary, 23° S. L. South boundary, 45° S. L. The difference of geographical latitude is not the only means of establishing boundary-lines and zones for the bread- plants ; the elevation above the sea is another agent, and in some cases in the warmer countries those zones which the latitude gives, change according to the elevation. In the centre, and partially in the south of Europe, the zone of wheat is resolved at a certain height into that of rye, barley, and oats, and the last-named grains also disappear at a greater elevation. On the Himalayas the cultivation of rice extends to a 136 THE EAKTH, PLANTS, AND MAS". height of about 3000 feet, it then gives place to wheat, which forms a zone between 3000 and 10,000 feet ; higher up, be- tween 10,000 and 12,000 or 13,000 feet, barley and oats are still grown. Barley attains this great elevation, especially on the north side, in Thibet. In the tropical regions of America, the zone of the plan- tain and mandioc, extends to 3000 feet, of maize to 6000 feet. After these, wheat and the other grains form a zone between 6000 or 9000 feet ; in the upper part of Peru these grains extend even to 10,000 feet, and particular places to 12,000 or 13,000 feet. In Peru and Mexico potatoes are cultivated up to 10,000 feet ; and in Peru, quinoa, to a still greater elevation above the sea. If we wish to reduce the most important bread-plants into two principal classes, tropical and extra-tropical, the first class must contain the rice, plantain, yam, sweet potato, chayote, arrow-root, cassava, bread-fruit, sago, cocoa-nut, taro, and date ; the second will include wheat, rye, barley, oats, buckwheat and potatoes ; maize is common to both. In regard to frequent occurrence, and to the number of human beings which the various bread-plants support, the rice, among the grains, undoubtedly holds the first rank, then follow wheat and maize, and lastly rye, barley, and oats. Among the other bread-plants the plantain, yam, bread-fruit, and potato, play the most important part. The bread-plants exhibit a great difference in respect to fruitfulness. A comparison even of the different kinds of grain shows that the tropical yield more nourishment than the extra- tropical. While wheat yields on an average five or six fold in Northern Europe, and eight or ten fold in Southern Europe, and the rest of the European grains about in the same pro- portion, maize yields in temperate climates eighty or a hun- dred fold, in the torrid zone three or four hundred fold, and rice a hundred fold. But the yield is more variable in these two grains than in the former; if drought ensues, the maize fails, andif the rainy season does not make its appearance, the rice is ruined. Hence great famine is frequent in India and China, especially since rice is so often the sole food in these regions. The plantain yields 133 times as much food as wheat on the same area. Hence a small garden around the native's hut THE GEOGRAPHY OF THE BEEAD-PLATTTS. 137 is sufficient to feed a family. Within a year after it is planted it bears ripe fruit ; if the stem is then cut off, new ones spring forth, which bear in three months. A cocoa-nut tree yields, on an average, thirty nuts a year, which is a considerable product, when we take into considera- tion the size of the nuts and the abundance of nutritious substance. The bread-fruit tree yields fresh fruit for eight or nine months of the year ; during the rest of the time, bread baked from the fruits, prepared like dough, is eaten ; it is estimated that three trees are sufficient to feed one human being. Cook expressed himself in the following terms : "If an inhabitant of the South Sea has planted ten bread-fruit trees during his life, he has fulfilled his duty towards his family as completely as a farmer among us, who has every year ploughed and sown, reaped and threshed ; nay, he has not only provided bread for his own lifetime, but left his children a capital in the trees." It is still easier to provide bread in the eastern islands of the Asiatic Archipelago, where sago grows wild in the woods. When the native has satisfied himself, by boring a hole in the trunk, that the pith is ripe, the trunk is cut down and divided into several pieces, the pith is scraped out, mixed with water, and strained, and there is sago-meal perfectly ready for use. A tree commonly yields 3001bs., and may afford 5001bs. or 6001bs. Thus a man goes into the woods and cuts his bread, as we hew our firewood. But the facility for obtaining bread seems to stand in inverse proportion to civilisation. Other causes certainly exist, especially the differences of national character, deter- mining the degree of civilisation in most of those regions where nature is so bountiful ; but the superabundance of nature herself undoubtedly contributes to lessen the energy of man. Strife against nature, when not too hard, advances civilisation. Labour is the mother of enlightenment. History has not preserved the record of those who first used the bread-plants, who first planted them ; for history could not come into existence until mankind had satisfied the first necessities. The early history of the bread-plants is en- veloped in obscurity, in the form of traditions and myths, according to which the gods themselves descended on to the earth to confer the great gift upon mankind. In India it was 138 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. Brahma ; in Egypt, Isis ; in Greece, Demeter ; in Italy, Ceres, who gave corn to the natives, and taught them to cultivate it. The ancient Peruvians had similar traditions respecting maize ; and so late as the advent of the Europeans, this grain, native to America, was cultivated round the Temple of the Sun, at a great elevation above the sea ; and the grain was distributed among the people, who believed thereby to ensure a fortunate harvest. It is a remarkable fact that we are still in uncertainty -whether the different kinds of grain still grow wild in the old world, and if so, in what region this occurs. Even the authors of antiquity were at variance as to whence wheat and barley, the chiefly-used grain at that time, had been derived, and in the various statements less regard seems to have been paid to actual facts, than to the fertility of the countries, and the desire to secure for the native land of the writer the honour of having furnished so great a gift to man- kind. The same uncertainty still prevails respecting these two kinds of grain, and the same is true of oats and rye. It was supposed that the rye had been found wild upon the Caucasus, but later observations have shown that this wild plant is different from the cultivated, particularly in having the central stem of the ear so brittle that it cannot be threshed. A wild rye is also found in Sicily, but this too has characteristics by which it differs from the cultivated kind. When plants are met with, in a wild condition, exactly like our kinds of grain, it is usually in places which have been cultivated at a former period, and thence it is probable that they are ouly outcasts, and not wild aborigines. Thus we do not know whether the parent plants of our northern grains have totally vanished, or have become so altered by cultivation in the course of time that we cannot recognise them in the species to which they actually do owe their origin. The same seems to hold of maize in America. This grain was already diffused over South and North America when the New World was discovered, and the statements which have recently been made respecting its occurrence as a wild plant, in Paraguay, for instance, leave the same doubt as to whether it is not merely an outcast from cultivation, which we meet with in respect to the grains of the Old World. Bice seems, indeed, to have its home in THE GEOGBAPHY OF THE BEEAD-PLANTS. 139 India, whether, however, the statement of the Danish mis- sionary, Klein, that he has found it wild there, is sufficient testimony, for similar reasons remains doubtful. Most of the accounts which we had of potatoes growing wild in Chili, Peru, and Mexico, have since proved to be unfounded, for it has been discovered that these referred to other species of the numerous genus to which the potato belongs. On the other hand, the date-palm grows wild in Africa and Arabia; the cocoa-nut in India, Ceylon, and the whole of Polynesia and Oceania ; the sago-palm in the East Indian Archipelago ; but all these occur in a more confined region of distribution than is occupied by the plants as now culti- vated. The bread-fruit tree, which occurs in the Indian Archipelago, and the buckwheat, which is found , wild in Siberia, near the Chinese border, may also be included among the bread-plants, which are known to occur still in a wild condition. The most important bread-plants of the present and the past might be represented on different maps, just as we have maps of ancient and modern geography. Com- parisons of them would show the migrations of the bread- plants, and interchange of them between the various countries and quarters of the globe. In the countries of the Mediterranean (Italy, Greece, Northern Africa, and Western Asia) wheat and barley were in antiquity the ordinary, very widely-diffused grains. "We find mention of them in the oldest writings, in the Bible, and by Homer and Herodotus ; we find representations of them in monuments of the earliest times. Millet was also known then, but played then, as now, a subordinate part. They had not rice at that time ; it was known only as an Indian plant ; the American grain, maize, was of course un- known at that time ; of rye (which even now is little culti- vated there) no certain traces found. Central and Northern- Europe had very little corn-culture at that time ; and in the same way as barley and oats ncfw furnish bread in the northernmost parts of Scandinavia and Scotland, according to Pliny, the ancient Germans lived upon oat-groats ; the inhabitants of the north probably pos- sessed no better bread-stuff. Eye seems to have come into Northern Europe at the time of the migrations of races from 140' THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. the Caucasian countries, without having entered the lands of the Mediterranean ; and wheat appears to have migrated at a later period from the south to the north of Europe, chiefly by way of France. In Africa, south of Atlas, the date-palm prevailed then as it does now. Hurra, which is now extensively diffused in North Africa, has been derived either from Nubia or Western Asia. India, as we see from the writings of antiquity, had then, as now, rice for the principal article of food ; the plantain grew there likewise, probably also the yam. It must be assumed that sago grew then in the Indian Archipelago, since it occurs wild there at present. Before the discovery of America, the principal material for bread in this part of the globe was maize, also cassava, possibly yams (a different species from the Indian), and potatoes and quinoa upon the mountains. The vast national migrations from Asia towards Europe, which took place in the middle ages, appeared to have merely caused one change, the penetration of rye into Northern Europe, and its gradual displacement of the oat. The great conquests of the Arabs in North Africa, Spain, Sicily, and other lands of the Mediterranean, brought rice from India, first to Egypt, and afterwards to the south of Europe ; they brought also the plantain from India to "Western Asia, Egypt, and Barbary ; by them was the durra, or, as they called it, the Moorish millet, diffused over the countries of the Mediterranean, especially North Africa and Portugal. The discovery of the road to India, southward of Africa, caused a far greater revolution, but above all the discovery of America. Maize was introduced from America, and became diffused with extraordinary rapidity over all the Mediterranean coun- tries, some parts of Central Europe, nay, it even found its way to China and Japan, and into the interior of Africa. The potato became known much more slowly through North- ern Europe and Northern Asia. Cassava was brought from America to the tropical regions of Africa and Asia. In return for these great gifts, America obtained the sup- posed European grains, which the colonists diffused and THE GEOGBAPHY OF THE BREAD-PLANTS. 141 continue to diffuse in North America, the temperate parts of South America, and over those elevated regions within the tropics which have a temperate climate. Brazil, Carolina, and other regions, thus obtained rice, which at present constitutes so important an article of culti- vation there. America also acquired the plantain ; some, however, believe that one species of plantain is a native of America. The European colonists also conveyed wheat and other European grains to the Cape Colony, and, after the coloni- sation of New Holland and Van Dieman's Land, to the tem- perate regions there. \ In respect to changes on a smaller scale, it is remarkable how rye has been gradually displaced by wheat in the north of Europe, just as at an earlier period the former displaced oats. In the period 1651-1675, the wheat exported from Dantzic bore to the rye which was exported thence the proportion of one to three ; in the period 1801-1825, the proportion was ex- actly reversed, namely, three to one. In the year 1758 it was calculated that not quite two-thirds of the population of Eng- land and Wales lived upon wheat ; the rest upon rye, barley, and oats. At present not one-eighth live upon the last. In the year 1727, a small wheat-field near Edinburgh was re- garded as a rarity in Scotland ; since 1780 the product of wheat in Scotland has increased tenfold. At that time wheaten bread was seen only at the tables of the richer classes ; at present, not only on that of the middle classes, but that of poorer people of the towns, and, in fact, of the country. In Denmark also the cultivation and the use of wheat has in- creased ; and indeed a time may come when the use of rye and that of wheat will stand in a totally different proportion from the present ; nay, it is even probable that Denmark will, at a remote future period, pass from the zone of rye into that of wheat. It would be interesting to have a complete summary of the production of oread-plants, and of the trade carried on with them ; but from want of sufficient statistical data, I must confine myself to a few observations respecting the production of, and trade in corn. While in antiquity, Sicily and all Barbary were the great granaries, these must now be chiefly sought in Northern Europe. 142 THE EAKTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. The plains lying to the south and south-east of the Baltic are especially adapted for the cultivation of grain, by the con- stitution of the soil and the comparatively warm and dry summer. Hence the most important granaries for a great portion of Europe are here. One of the most important cities on the Baltic for the export of corn is Dantzic. Lying at the mouth of the "Weichsel, which, with its tributaries, especially the Berg, flows through fertile corn-plains, the city receives the grain by water communication, in flat-bottomed boats. According to an average of twenty-five years, 1801- 1825, 535,000 tons— namely, 400,000 tons of wheat and 135,000 tons of rye — were exported annually ; but in the three years 1829-1831, 559,000 tons of wheat and 117,000 tons of rye, making together 676,000 tons. In particular years, when the conjunctures were favourable, especially when the English corn-market was open, the export of corn has amounted to 1,000,000 tons.* The other important points for the export of grain, on the Baltic, are Memel, Konigsberg, Stettin, Eiga, and St. Peters- burgh. According'to an average of six years (1830 and 1836-1840), the total export of corn from Eussia amounts to 4,500,000 tons ; if we deduct from this about half a million for Arch- angel, one million for Odessa, and half a million for the other export towns on the Black Sea, the export from Eiga and St. Petersburgh amounts to about 2,500,000 tons. The export from Konigsberg, Memel, Stettin, and Eostock, I do not know accurately, but they may be set at 1,000,000 or 1,500,000 tons.' Consequently 4,000,000 or 4,500,000 tons are exported from the countries on the south and south-east of the Baltic. Although Archangel lies in the White Sea and near to the northern boundary of the cultivation of corn, it has still a considerable export, which amounted to 400,000 tons, according to an average of the years 1827-1832. The river Dwina connects this city with a large tract of country rich in grain. Here, however, as might be expected, the export consists almost wholly of rye and oats. The export of corn from Denmark is very considerable. * As the commercial intercourse of the last few years cannot, for many reasons, be considered as natural, we have used in this, as in several succeeding essays, the results of earlier years. THE GEOGBA.PHY OE THE BBEAD-PLA.NTS. 143 According to statistical tables, the average of twenty years (1820-1839) gives a surplus of 1,354,803 tons, exported from the entire kingdom of Denmark ;* in the year 1839 the sur- plus amounted even to 1,850,357 tons. The export of corn in ground and baked condition has increased of late years ; in the four years 1820-1823, only 3406 tons of wheat-flour were exported, and no bread ; in the four years 1836-1839, on the contrary, 62,646 tons of wheat-flour, and 38,271 of bread. The export from the ports of the Baltic, from Archangel, and from Denmark, provide for the deficiency of grain in the Scandinavian peninsula, especially in Norway. A portion goes to England, some to Holland, Belgium, and Prance, some even to South America. The second great granary of Europe lies in the south-west of Russia, which is inclined towards the Black Sea, and tra- versed by the rivers Dnieper and Dniester ; in particular, Volhynia and the formerly Polish provinces. Odessa is the most important place of export for this great production of grain ; on an average more than a million tons of wheat are annually exported ; but only a small quantity of other kinds of grain. The wheat of the Black Sea goes to Turkey, Greece, Italy, and Spain, and moreover to England also. A third corn country of importance is Egypt, whence wheat is in like manner conveyed chiefly to the ports of Southern Europe. Those portions of North America which lie within, the corn-limits, also export grain. Canada sends wheat to Eng- land; the United States of North America export wheat and maize, principally in the shape of flour, especially to the West Indies and South Anerica, the most important places of export being New York, Philadelphia, New Orleans, and Baltimore. Carolina furnishes much rice to Europe and South America. Brazil exports rice ; and Southern Chili, as also the Cape Colonies, wheat. A mutually important rice-trade subsists between the two Indian peninsulas, China and the Indian Archipelago. In several countries the false politico-economical dogmas, " Buckwheat, peas, vetches, rape and linseed, which are included in the tables among the grains, are deducted here. 144 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. as regards the corn-trade, have been gradually discarded, according to which it was considered advisable sometimes to forbid the export of grain, sometimes to allow it, and to alter the tax upon foreign corn according to circumstances. Poli- tical economists have drawn attention to the evils of that system. Manufacturers and other industrial classes were compelled to pay an extravagant price for the first neces- saries of life ; the sale of manufactured goods and colonial wares was diminished, because foreign agricultural nations were not allowed to give their corn in exchange ; and through the great instability of the corn-trade which necessarily re- sulted from the system, both the provision for the country was rendered less secure, and the price of foreign corn raised much higher than it would be under a steady market, on which producers and merchants could calculate. GEOGRAPHY OP ORNAMENTAL PLANTS. 145 CHAPTEK XVII. THE GEOGRAPHICAL BISTEIBITTION OP THE MOST IMPORTANT ORNAMENTAL PLANTS. An answer to the inquiry where the most important orna- mental plants have their home, to what regions we especially owe the brilliant flowers and elegant plants which decorate our gardens, our rooms, and our conservatories, must be of some interest, more particularly when we reflect that these questions stand in connexion with the general history of civilisation. Northern Europe, where the art of gardening has risen to a greater height, and horticulture is more extensively diffused than elsewhere, does not, from the unstable, usually damp climate and severe winter, afford a great abundance of wild plants distinguished by splendour of colour or elegance of form ; and since, at the same time, foreign objects are usually more attractive than those which we have at home, no great number of our cultivated flowers and ornamental plants have been derived from our own meadows, fields, or woods. A few, however, have found their way into the flower-bed, as the daisy, the violet, the pansy, the lily-of- the-valley, the rocket, the forget-me-not, the primrose, the hepatica, and the maiden pink. The snow-ball (Viburnum opulus), which occurs frequently in our woods, has become a favourite shrub in our gardens, from the peculiarity that all the corollas of its inflorescence may become barren, so as to form the pretty white globular bunches, known by the name of snow-balls. Many of our native plants certainly deserve a place in gardens ; some of our more showy Bora- gineous plants, and the beautiful Orchids, might claim espe- cial attention ; unfortunately, however, the latter are difficult of cultivation. The countries which surrov/nd the Mediterranean, and form a naturally enclosed basin, have a climate essentially different from that of Northern Europe, and their flora is very dif- ferent. Winter is particularly mild here, in the southern parts wholly free from frost and snow ; while the summer weather is very constant, and at the same time, in the south, almost L 146 THE EARTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. without rain ; the atmosphere is also very clear. A great number of trees retain their leaves in winter, many bulbous plants decorate the fields and meadows, particularly in spring, and numerous aromatic plants, especially of the family of the Labiate, fill the air with sweet odours during the dry summer. It was natural that as the taste for floricul- ture became gradually awakened in the Northern European countries, attention should be turned chiefly to the South, where the intellectual cultivation of mankind was so old, and where horticulture rose to a higher pitch, even in the middle ages, than northward of the Alps. Hence we have, in fact, obtained the greater part of our commonly cultivated ornamental plants from the basin of the Mediter- ranean. Prom there have come so many of our summer plants, which are capable of flourishing in our climate, from the fact that their life is limited tcthe summer, and the cold of winter has no opportunity of affecting them, such as the summer stocks, the mignonette, the adonis, the major con- volvulus, the Venus' s looking-glass ; from there we have obtained a ''number of bulbous and tuberous plants, the whole vital force of which is concentrated during a portion of the year in the bulb or tuber, and which can therefore lie, during the cold season, in a winter sleep, as it were, during which we keep the bulb or tuber out of the ground. Among these may be named the species of hyacinth and narcissus, crocus and tulip. We, moreover, owe to this part of the globe various perennial plants, which are kept in the house in winter,* and planted out in the summer, such as the wallflower and winter stock ; certain shrubby plants which, although they belong to a milder climate, are capable of bearing our winter, such as the lavender and box ; and lastly, certain trees, shrubs, and herbs, which grow in orangeries, such as the bay-laurel, the orange and lemon trees, the cypress, the myrtle, the oleander, and the rosemary. "When we ascend to a certain height on the Alps, and other mountain-chains which separate Northern from Southern Europe, we meet with the lovely and most characteristic Alpine flora, which affords neither trees nor shrubs, but only (* It must be borne in mind throughout this essay that the author writes in Denmark. The plants referred to, however, are so well known, that after this note there can scarcely be any misconception. — Ed.) GEOGBAPHTOF OBNAMENTAL PLANTS. 147 dwarf perennial herbs, with comparatively large flowers of beautiful and pure colours. Few of the flower.-i of this flora are found in our gardens, and the cause of this is chiefly to be sought in the circumstance that it is so difficult, in the lowlands, to contrive the external conditions under which these plants are met with in their native habitats. For there they are covered with snow for eight or nine months of the year ; the air is transparent, yet the summer temperature is low ; the soil is composed of the gravel formed by the disin- tegrated rocks of the Alps, permeated by the snow-water which flows down from the higher peaks. Nevertheless we owe to the Alps our most beautiful spring plants, the auri- cula, the soldanella, the gentians, &c. Lower down than the Alpine herbs, in the subalpine regions, grow the rhododen- drons, and still lower the aconites and the laburnums. The Polar flora, or vegetation of the most northern parts of Europe, agrees very closely with the Alpine flora. For reasons similar to those mentioned in reference to the latter, but few plants of the Polar flora have been included among our garden flowers ; Papaver nudicaule may be named as an example of them. Although Siberia has a severe climate, this country, from the clear atmosphere which prevails in the interior of large continents, and the comparatively high summer temperature, affords a number of plants with flowers of a considerable size and of the liveliest colours. From there we have the Papaver bracteatum, Pmonia albiflora, Delphinium grandi- florum, Viola altaica, &c. In China, and Japan, which agrees with it in regard to the country and the people, floriculture has existed from the highest antiquity, and has been brought to a high degree of perfection, although in some respects it has degenerated into trifling. The most important plants which we owe to these countries, are the camellias, the China aster, the hydrangea, the Indian and Chinese chrysanthemums, the China primrose, Kerriajaponica, the Chinese lilac, &c. As the climate is there considerably warmer than with us, the greater portion of the plants have to be kept in houses. From the tropical climate of India, it follows that we can in general obtain from this luxuriantly gifted country but few plants for our gardens, most of them being suited only l 2 148 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. for our hot-houses. Among the universally diffused Indian ornamental plants may be mentioned, the balsam, the ole- ander, and two species of Canna. The highlands of India, whence, from its temperate climate, one might expect a num- ber of plants suited to our climate, and which would suc- ceed out of doors with us, have only been recently opened ; but already our gardens are decked by many beautiful plants from there, such as Potentilla formosa and atrosanguinea. Persia has been renowned from the most ancient times for its flower-gardens ; we owe to it the crown imperial, the peach, and the two species of lilac. The vegetation of New Holland, like the animal life of that country, has a highly peculiar character ; since, however, the great continent has only recently been investigated botani- cally, it is only of late that plants from there have become objects of cultivation in European gardens. The greatest number are met with in the English gardens, and they have been diffused thence over the other countries of Europe. The climatal conditions in which these plants are naturally situated, render them only cultivable in conservatories with us. Among the Australian plants, we find especially the trees and shrubs of the myrtle-family, with dry, evergreen leaves {Eucalyptus, Melaleuca, Metrosideros, Leptospermum, &c), then a peculiar group of the genus Acacia, which have a pecu- liar aspect from the absence of leaves, the place of which is supplied by broad, fiat leaf-stalks ; moreover, the large family of the Proteacese, of which no examples occur wild in Europe, containing trees with dry, leathery, persistent leaves ; and the genus Epacris, which includes heatla-like shrubs. The Southern, part of Africa is perhaps the richest region of the earth in regard to vegetation ; most of the genera are there extremely rich in species, and much splendour of colour and beauty of form are met with in the flowers. It is the proper home of the succulent plants ; there we find the nume- rous genus Stapelia, with strange, juicy stems, the not less rich genus Mesembryanthemum, with handsome flowers ; species of Aloe, Crassula, and Mochea ; further, a great abundance of Liliaceous plants, of the genera Ixia, Gladiolus, Aqapanihus, &c. ; the many heaths ; the genus Pelargonium, with manifold species and varieties, and the group of Proteacese, which are also met with there as prevailing trees and shrubs. GEOGBAPHY Or OBNAMENTAL PLANTS. 149 _ The climatal similarity between North America and Europe gives rise to the conjecture that a great number of the plants of that part of the globe must also be capable of flourishing in the open air with us. We have, in fact, obtained many- plants from them, especially trees and bushes for our pleasure- grounds. Among the trees may be named various species of oak and Conifers ; the tulip-tree, the acacia, as it is called (JRobinia pseudacacia, the locust-tree), and the red-flowered robinias ; among the shrubs, the genera Spiraea, Kalmia, Azalea, Calycanthus floridus, various Composite, such as Bud- beckia, Aster, Solidago, and Coreopsis. As the highlands of Mexico lie 6000 feet above the sea, the climate is temperate. Hence various Mexican plants bear our climate, at least our summer. Among these are the genera Pentstemon, Zinnia, Tagetes, and the superb Tigridia. The dahlia, which was unknown in Europe in the last cen- tury, is now one of the most important ornamental plants. Tropical South America, like Mexico, has only since a recent period furnished Europe with ornamental plants. Erom thence chiefly we have obtained the Cactus family, which presents itself in such extremely varied and strange forms, like angular columns, snake-like bodies, jointed, flat- tened, or cylindrical stems, or globular melon-shaped masses, very often bearing splendid flowers. To this part of the world, also, we owe the passion-flower, and various kinds of Amaryllis. Peru and Chili, also, have only recently opened to us their floral treasures. As the highlands have a temperate cli- mate, various plants from these will flourish in our open borders ; others require to be kept in houses. To this flora belong the sunflower, Tropceolum, Fuchsia, Schizanthus, Cal- ceolaria, and Salpiglossis. California, again, and the countries of the river Columbia, have of late years given us various plants which thrive in the open air, such as several species of Gilia, Collomia, liupirms, Pentstemon, the beautiful Ribes sanguineum, and several species of pine remarkable for the height they attain. When we survey the geographical distribution of the orna- mental plants, it becomes evident, that while similarity or approximation of the climate to ours plays, indeed, an im- portant part, especially in regard to the plants thriving in the 150 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. open air, at the same time geographical discovery, and earlier or later colonisation and civilisation of distant parts of the globe, have great influence. This is particularly seen when ■we pay attention at the same time to the periods at which the various plants have been introduced into European gardens. The oldest of our ornamental plants have been obtained from the northern and southern parts of Europe. The sphere was afterwards extended to the Chinese, Indian, and South African plants ; next to the North American ; then to the Australian, Mexican, and Peruvian ; and, lastly, to those of Brazil, Chili, and California. In this manner have the different parts of the earth's surface gradually opened their treasures to us. Variety has constantly increased in our gardens, which have constantly ap- proached nearer to a collection of the most beautiful objects which earth produces in the vegetable kingdom. Formerly, the introduction of ornamental plants was acci- dental. Diplomatists, merchants, or travellers, who had a taste for horticulture, sent or brought home one or other beautiful plant. Subsequently, travelling botanists under- took this task, especially when they were accompanied by a gardener who could attend to the collection, and to the pre- servation of what was obtained, for which the observers them- selves scarcely had time. In recent times, since horticulture has so increased, and gardeners have possessed scientific edu- cation, they have been the chief persons who have under- taken travels with this intent, and they have essentially con- tributed to multiply the number of ornamental plants in our parterres and pleasure-grounds. Among these there is scarcely one who has done greater service in this respect than the Scotchman, David Douglas. He travelled for the English Horticultural Society, especially in the United States and on the north-west coast of North America, particularly on the Columbia river, whence he introduced, in greater number than any one else, trees, shrubs, and herbs capable of sustaining cold, partly sending, partly bringing them home with him, namely, 53 arborescent and 145 herbaceous plants, making in all, 198. The greater portion of these were wholly new, and since they were able to bear the climate of Europe, they have become extraordinarily diffused, both in the gar- dens of Great Britain and of the Continent, and they are GEOGRAPHY. OF ORNAMENTAL PLANTS. 151 seldom absent from the smallest. The many new species of Pentstemon, Lupinus, (Enothera, Qilia, and Collomia, espe- cially deserve mention, and next to them the new and beau- tiful species of Bibes, as well as several kinds of Pinus. After he had done so much in America, he travelled to the Sandwich Islands ; but here he fell a sacrifice to his zeal, and perished in a melancholy manner, falling into a pit which had been dug by the natives to catch wild cattle, where a bull, which had already fallen in, attacked and killed him. He was then thirty-six years of age. When we con- sider the influence the cultivation of flowers exercises in a moral point of view, we may fairly say that this man sacri- ficed his life as honourably in his calling, as a man who falls on the field of battle. The care of flowers and the cultivation of plants do not merely contribute to the main- tenance of health, they soften the passions, and elevate the taste above the affairs of every-day life. In the home around which we see a well-kept garden, internal order almost always prevails ; and when there is a flower-stand outside, there is almost always a book-shelf within. He who sacrifices his life in contributing to advance such influences among thou- sands, confers greater benefit upon the world in general than those who fall by the bullet, and often advance merely ambition and covetousness. 152 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. CHAPTEE XVIII. THE COFFEE-TEEE. As in regard to the human race, not only is universal history interesting, but also that of a particular nation, and even of a single individual, if he has played an important part, so perhaps may a biographical treatment, if I may so term it, of the history of particular species of plants prove interesting, and the choice of the coffee-tree be approved of on account of the importance of its influence. "We -will therefore make its acquaintance. In Arabia and in Java the coffee-tree attains a height of fifteen or twenty feet ; in the West Indies it does not grow so high, because it is cut, in order that its crown may spread and thus bear a greater quantity of fruit, at the same time more accessible. The shoots are opposite, the leaves the same ; they somewhat resemble those of the bay-laurel, and like them are evergreen. The white and sweet-scented flowers seated on short stalks are crowded in the axils of the leaves. "When the coffee-tree is in blossom, it looks as if covered with snow, an aspect which must surpass that of our flowering fruit-trees. After the blossom, appears a red fruit, a kind of berry, which resembles the cherry in colour and form ; the pulpy mass encloses two seeds, which are convex on one side and flat on the other ; these we call the coffee-beans, an unsuitable name, since the fruit is not in a pod. The coffee-tree bears in the second rear, but the proper crop does not arrive until the fourth or fifth year. To make it thrive it requires a warm climate ; it will not grow when the mean temperature is below 68° to 70° Fahr., and the thermometer must not fall below 55°. Never- theless it will not bear too strong a heat ; in regions which have such a climate it will only flourish under the shade of other trees. It requires also abundance of rain or artificial watering. Prom these conditions of temperature and humi- dity, it may be concluded that the coffee-tree can only flourish within the tropics, or at most up to 30°, and that in this zone it succeeds but on the hills, and not in the flat coast regions. The northern part of the Arabian peninsula has for the THE COFFEE-TEEE. 153 most part a dry sandy soil, a very hot and almost rainless climate ; this is true of the southern coast border, turned toward the Red Sea ; but at some distance from the sea, in the most southern part of the peninsula, there rises a con- siderable chain of mountains, with a cooler climate, abun- dance of rain, and a rich vegetation. Here, in Yemen or Arabia Felix, was long exclusively sought the home of the coffee-tree. Now it is known, that it not only occurs as a cultivated tree in Abyssinia, but that it is found both cultivated and wild in the woods in the countries south of • Abyssinia, Enarea, and Caffa. On the other hand, it is probable that it is not indigenous in Arabia, but has been introduced from that African habitat. It goes as far towards the equator as our knowledge of the country extends, and northward it appears cultivated on the Lake Tsana, about 12° ; in Arabia, as far as the 18°— 20° N. L. The history of many discoveries is enveloped in obscurity. Fabulous narratives readily take the place of actual facts. Among them must we reckon the following tale of the cause of the first use of the coffee-bean : The superior of a Mo- hamedan monastery had observed that the goats became very wakeful, jumping and skipping at night, after they had eaten this fruit ; this led him to prepare a drink from the fruit, in order to keep himself and his dervises awake, when they had to pass the whole night in performing services in the temple. That the use of coffee dates only from a recent period, is certain. The ancient Greek and Roman writers are quite silent regarding this beverage. An Arabian manuscript in the Paris library, written by Abdalcader toward the close of the sixteenth century, and published by the Oriental scholar Galland, places the first general use of coffee in Temen no further back than about the middle of the fifteenth century ; that is to say, only 400 years from our own epoch. The legend is related by the Arabian author in the following manner: In Aden, on the south coast of Arabia, lived a Mufti, named Gemaledin; on a journey to Aden, on the west coast of the Red Sea, he met with some of his country- men, who used coffee as a beverage ; on his return, it struck him that this might perhaps conduce to his health. Experi- ment convinced him that it was a good means of clearing the 154 THE EABTH, PLANT-S, AND MAN. head and preventing sleep, and he therefore recommended it to the dervises who had to keep vigils ; these and others soon found that it was a good day-drink also. Coffee thus be- came general in Aden, it spread from there over the rest of Arabia, and reached Mecca about the end of the same (15th) century. Here we have not, indeed, the epoch of the first use of coffee, but that of its general use in Arabia. At the commencement of the sixteenth century (1511) the Sultan of Egypt named a new governor of Mecca. The latter, 'who was not acquainted with coffee, was greatly angered at finding some dervises in a great mosque, sitting in a corner and drinking coffee. He drove them out of the temple, and called a council of theologians, jurisconsults, and the most distinguished men of the city. The matter was argued at great length ; one of those present made the assembly laugh, by declaring that coffee intoxicated as much as wine: thereby confessing that he had tasted the for- bidden beverage, and he was punished for this crime by the bastinado, as prescribed by law. The council, being unable to come to an agreement, had recourse to the physicians. The governor called in two Persian doctors, who declared that coffee was injurious to health, upon which the council condemned it. It was forbidden to sell this beverage, all stores of it were burnt, and those who were convicted of having drunk coffee were led round the city sitting xipon asses. Nevertheless the prohibition was soon withdrawn, for the Sultan at Cairo was himself a good coffee-drinker, and his most learned men declared it both harmless and per- missible. Through this victory coffee became still more widely known and diffused. Twenty years later, however, a zealot of Cairo, where the use of coffee had become quite general, took it into his head to preach violently against it ; he declared that those who drank coffee were not good Mussulmans. His hearers were so excited by this, that when they came out of the temple, they hastened to the coffee-houses, broke the cups and tables, and ill-used the guests. The city became divided into two parties, and the matter began to grow serious. But the chief judge of the city called together the wise men, who declared with one voice that it had been long settled that coffee was both permissible and useful. The president then THE COITEE-TUEE. 155 treated them all with coffee, taking the first cup himself. This new victory still further diffused the name and the celebrity ofl the beverage. In the first half of the sixteenth century the use of coffee spread to Aleppo, Damascus, and various cities, and in the middle of the same century it reached Constantinople. Two private persons here opened, in 1554, an establishment with convenient couches, where coffee was served, and where the visitors might converse and play chess. A Turkish poet wrote a sonnet in praise of coffee. But as the number of coffee-houses increased greatly, the priests began to complain that these were more frequented than the mosques. The mufti declared that the beverage was opposed to the Koran, and therefore all the coffee-houses were closed. But a new mufti declared in favour of coffee ; and the priesthood, the court, and the city, soon followed his example. After that, the coffee-houses were indeed occasionally closed on political grounds, as it was found that people had too good opportu- nity of gossiping about the sultan's undertakings ; but this prohibition only extended to the metropolis, and did not there affect the drinking of coffee in private houses. Its use spread more and more ; coffee was offered to every guest, and as among us the people are accustomed to receive drink-money, the Turks in like manner had their coffee-money ; in large houses an especial servant was appointed to prepare and serve coffee ; nay, there existed a Turkish law, that if a man refused his wife coffee, she had a legal ground for separation. Thus was the custom of drinking coffee established in the seventeenth century, in the Levant and Egypt, about 150 years after its commencement in Arabia. Previous to the middle of the seventeenth century, very little was known of coffee in Europe (excepting in Turkey). Prosper Alpin, a botanist of Padua, who was in Egypt to- wards the end of the sixteenth century, speaks of this beve- rage as general there, but unknown hi Europe ; his second edi- tion, published under the direction of Vesling, speaks of coffee as a medicinal agent, rare in Europe. It is not improbable that it came first to Venice. A letter is extant of Pietro della Valle, from Constantinople, in which he says (1615) that he intends to bring some coffee with him when he re- turns to Italy. In 1663 some merchants, returning home 156 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. from the Levant to Marseilles, brought some coffee-beans with them, and exhibited them and the utensils used in pre- paring them as a rarity ; somewhat later, the drinking of coffee began to make its appearance there in the houses of the mercantile people, and in 1671 a coffee-house was opened. The first who brought coffee to England was also a merchant returning from Smyrna, who had brought a Greek girl with him to prepare his coffee ; she married his coachman, and this couple opened the first coffee-house in London. In Paris, coffee came more particularly into use after the ambas- sador of the Sultan Mahommed IV. had resided there a long time, and had entertained the court with the new beverage. The first coffee-house in Paris was opened in 1672. In Mar- seilles, where, as already mentioned, coffee had come some- what earlier into use through the merchants returning from Smyrna, it had still a contest to maintain. The physicians were disquieted by the diffusion of this beverage, which they regarded as injurious ; they resolved to make it the subject of a public disputation. By a programme, which still exists, an invitation called disputants to the contest in the town- hall, and this programme had the tone of a declaration of war ; but this was just as little able to banish the use of coffee as the attack of the Mohamedan zealots. Yet we see that the arguments of the defenders of coffee were not always of the soundest, for the manifesto confuted those who had urged as a proof that coffee was a good beverage, that it was called Ion in Turkey, and that it came from Arabia Felix. Coffee came into Denmark at a somewhat later period. That coffee was unknown in Denmark at the beginning of the seventeenth century, is seen from the work of the cele- brated Bartholin, " De Pharmacopeia Danica," 1665. In this it is said : " Coffee has very rapidly seized upon the courts of Europe, not exactly because it is well-flavoured, but because it is something new ; it is said to give a good appetite, and to prevent sleep. Thus we have here an opportunity of con- firming Seneca's words : ' Poolishness readily causes trouble, while truth advances slowly and observes moderation.' " The constantly increasing consumption of coffee in Europe increased the production in Arabia, especially when, at the beginning of the eighteenth century, the trade-route over Egypt to Marseilles was found insufficient, and vessels went THE COFFEE-TKEE. 157 round the Cape of G-ood Hope to Arabia itself. It was natural that men should then think of transplanting the precious tree to other countries. The Dutch governor, Hoorn, had plants brought to Batavia ; but the cultivation of coffee does not seem to have commenced there until somewhat later (1723). He also sent, in 1713, several trees to the Burgomaster "Wetsen of Amsterdam, and a year after one came to Paris from there. Here several plants were raised from seed, and not much later, namely, in 1717, Declieux conveyed one of them to Martinique. The voyage across was difficult and tedious ; they suffered from want of water ; but Declieux was sparing of his own store of water, in order to be able to water his young coffee-tree. It is asserted that all the coffee-trees of the West Indies and Brazils have been derived from this plant ; and if this is true, the greater part of the enormous quantity of coffee which is now used in Europe has been derived from one single tree raised in a botanical garden. From Martinique the coffee-tree spread to St. Domingo and the other "West India Islands, as also to Surinam ; while the Isle of Bourbon and the Mauritius had obtained the coffee-tree direct from Arabia in 1718. St. Domingo long remained the chief seat of the American coffee- culture. In Necker's time this island exported 76,000,000 lbs. ; this is several times as much as Arabia at any time ex- ported; but the insurrection of the negroes very much diminished this flourishing off-shoot ; the white planters took refuge in Cuba, Jamaica, and on the mainland of America. These countries, in which the cultivation of coffee first commenced towards the close of the last century, now produce an extraordinary quantity. Brazil has subsequently applied itself to this ; the coffee-tree is here rapidly increasing, and Bio Janeiro has become a powerful competitor in the coffee-trade. The annual consumption of coffee in Europe may be stated at present at 250,000,000 lbs. To 50,000,000 for North Ame- rica must be added the consumption in the East, North Africa, and the countries which themselves produce coffee, and thus the total amount will not be set too high if we estimate it at 400,000,000 lbs. A little more than a hun- dred years ago, all coffee was fetched from Arabia, and the 158 THE EAKTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. entire consumption amoixnted to about 10,000,000 lbs. or 12,000,000 lbs. In this degree, therefore, has increased the use of a beverage which two hundred years ago was unknown in Europe. "What an alteration in the modes of life, in commerce and in navigation, and what changes in the civili- sation of those countries which have successively appeared as producers of coffee ! But the greatest increase of the use of coffee is a character peculiarly of the most recent times, for in 1820 the consumption of coffee in Europe amounted to only 140,000,000 lbs. It would he interesting to know how the said quantity of 250,000,000 lbs. is distributed among the different nations of Europe ; a map, with the countries marked with a parti- cular colour, where coffee is drunk, and which indicated by shades the greater or less consumption, would show us at a glance which nations are the greatest coffee-drinkers, which drink only a little or none at all ; but we have not sufficient material for such a survey. It would require to be made in one and the same year for all Europe, since different coun- tries exhibit great revolutions in the consumption of coffee within short periods. In no country is this more the case than in the British Islands ; up to 1808, the English drank scarcely any coffee ; the entire consumption amounted only to 1,000,000 lbs., only one-third of what is now used in Den- mark. From 1809 to 1820, it had increased to 7,000,000 lbs. or 8,000,000 lbs., and at the same time Paris alone consumed 5,000,000 lbs. ; but in 1832, the consumption had risen to 22,000,000 lbs., that is to say, three times as much as in 1820, and twenty-two times as much as before the year 1809. In Denmark also the consumption has increased. Pontoppidan, in his Economic Balance of Denmark, estimated, in 1759, the annual consumption of- coffee at about 500,000 lbs., and he included the whole of the agricultural population among those who drank no coffee. In the years 1824-1828, the amount upon which duty was levied for home use in the kingdom, amounted on an average to 1,500,000 lbs. ; in 1829-1833, 2,500,000 lbs. ; in 1834-1838, 3,330,000 lbs. ; in 1839-1841, 3,600,000 lbs. The Danes drink more coffee than the English, for in Denmark the consumption is at the rate of 3 lbs. for each THE COFFEE-TEEE. 159 person; in England (1832), only lib. per head. In the German Customs Union (where the duty is much higher), 2 lbs. In Sweden, only 1^ lb. is consumed for each person. If we inquire the principal cause of the great increase of the consumption of coffee, we find it undoubtedly in the great diminution of the price since 1818-1820. Humboldt esti- mated the 140,000,000 lbs. consumed in Europe in 1820, at about 6,000,0002.; if the 250,000,000 lbs. which are now- consumed are estimated at 6d. per pound, we shall only get 6,250,000Z. ; and if the pound is estimated at 8d., only 8,333,3332. Europe, therefore, obtains much more for the same sum than at that time ; when we compare the price, we see that it was, for example, in England, almost twice as high in 1820 as at present ; in 1818 it was still higher; and in 1828, on the contrary, lower than at present. It has been found by experience, especially in England, that diminution of the tax upon coffee increased the consumption to such a degree, that the actual receipts of duty were even consider- ably increased. Before 1808 the duty was three times as high as at present ; at that time the consumption amounted only to 1,000,000 lbs. ; in the years 1809-1820, it averaged, as already mentioned, about 7,000,000 lbs. It must not be overlooked, it is true, that the reduction of the duty lessened the quantity introduced contraband, and that part of the increase which tax-tables give is no real increase of con- sumption of coffee ; but it will readily be admitted, that there was not smuggled in before 1808 six times as much as then paid duty there. That it is chiefly the consumption which becomes increased, is seen from the fact that the increase did not merely occur in the first and succeeding years after the lowering of the duty, but that the consumption has only in- creased gradually in subsequent years. In Denmark, also, it has been proved that the diminution of the tax increases the consumption. Toward the end of the year 1830, the tax on coffee was lowered from 6-|d. to 3d. The statements given above show the influence of this reduction. While the lowering of the price produces an increase of consumption, the consumption does not decrease if the price subsequently rises, it being understood that this elevation of price be not too great, or occur too suddenly. It will readily 160 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. be understood, that when coffee has come into use, the con- sumers do not give it up if the price should become a little raised. The reason why the price of coffee has so considerably diminished since 1820, lies evidently above all in the increased production ; and especially in the greatly increased product of Brazil, which has come forward as a stronger competitor. "With regard to the producing countries, the "West Indies export the greatest quantity, namely, 100,000,000 lbs. ; St. Domingo, 30,000,000 lbs. ; Cuba, 28,000,000 lbs. ; then fol- lows Brazil and the rest of the continent of South America, with 64,000,000 lbs. ; next Java, with 38,000,000 lbs. ; and Arabia, with 24,000,000 lbs. The remaining places furnish but little compared with these. The great mobility and changeableness of the producing countries, the amount of product, the consumption, and the price, must certainly be the cause of great calamities to indi- vidual traders, to individual mercantile cities, and to the planters of particular countries. In this way, all those who are interested in the Java coffee-plantations have suffered greatly from the lower price of the Brazil coffee, although the latter is certainly inferior. But it is equally certain that the coffee-trade, as a whole, must increase in compass ; for as the price sinks, the consumption increases ; the increased con- sumption then causes the price to rise, and the consumers, once secured, as already observed, are not lost to the trade when the price becomes higher. To acquire conviction of the fact that the trade must gain, on the whole, by the ex- tended production and the increased consumption, it is simply requisite to look back to the coffee-trade a hundred years ago, when it was carried on with a few ships which brought coffee from Egypt and the Levant to Marseilles, and to com- pare this with the present condition of this branch of com- merce. That the consumption of coffee will increase further, is more than probable. "We have seen that 3 lbs. per head are used in Denmark. But since few would content them- selves with this quantity, and since we must wish that as many as possible of our fellow-citizens should get as much as we do, it is clear there is full scope, a wide margin, at all events for wishes. THE COFFEE-TEEE. 161 But when we reflect that Denmark now consumes about 80,000Z. worth of coffee, perhaps the adherents of the old school of political economy, which regards it as a misfortune for a country to pay away so much money for foreign goods, might be a little disturbed. Tet this fear is groundless. We do not obtain our coffee from foreigners for nothing ; but there is no danger of the foreigners emptying our gold and silver mines. Our gold and silver mines are grain and oily and fatty substances, and the more we can sell of these the better. If our people can so increase and improve their grain and fatty products as to place the country in a position to buy more coffee, we will gladly allow them this as a pay- ment for their greater industry. If we could represent by a map that condition, which I would call the movement of the production, consumption, and trade of coffee, it would present itself as a great current from America, another, smaller however, from Arabia and Java, towards Europe, currents which here divide constantly into finer branches from the great commercial cities to the smaller, from these to the villages, and in even smaller offshoots to- wards the hamlets and houses, not unlike the current of the blood which ramifies into all parts of the body. By this in- creasing ramification, the influx from the sources is especially increased, and this increase calls new sources into existence, which enlarge the stream. For example, the fact of the peasantry having begun to drink coffee, has contributed to render new land productive by the cultivation of coffee, in Brazil, and to enable new families to establish themselves there. The increased production thus diminishes the price of coffee, and the lower price brings new coffee-drinkers ; thus the influx of coffee increases, and thereby the produc- tion. A reduction of the duty may be regarded as the open- ing of a new sluice for the stream to pass through. Lastly, could we obtain a general view of the influence which the use of coffee as a beverage has had in diminishing the consumption of spirits, an influence which perhaps ex- ceeds that which the Temperance unions have had., and could we, as we have done with the quantity and the price, collect into one sum all the cheerful moments which this beverage has procured, astonishment would also be excited in this re- 162 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. spect. But it is a biography, and not an eulogy, which, we promised to deliver here ; the age of eulogies, moreover, has nappily passed by. (Note.— The following additional particulars in reference to the statistics of coffee are taken from a paper read before the Statistical Society of London, January, 1852, by Mr. Crawford. rrobable amount of Coffee produced at tlie present time. Brazil 176,000,000 lbs. Java 124,000,000 — Philippine Islands 3,000,000 — Celebes 1,000,000 — Arabia 3,000,000 — Cuba and Porto Kico 30,000,000 — Laguaira and Porta Cabella ... 35,000,000 — British West Indies 8,000,000 — French and Dutch West Indies 2,000,000 — Malabar and Mysore 5,000,000 — St. Domingo 35,000,000 — Ceylon 40,000,000 — Sumatra 5,000,000 — Costa Rica 9,000,000 — Total 476,000,000 lbs. 476,000,000 lbs. estimated at 21. 10s. per cwt. in Europe would exceed 10,000,000?. in value, and supposing 300,000,000 lbs. only to be subject to a duty of 3d. per lb., it would yield a revenue of 3,700,000?. to the various govern- ments of Europe, with a prime cost to the consumer of 13,700,000?. ; while the additional expenses of transport, and wholesale and retail profit, would raise the actual price paid by the consumer to 20,000,000/. per annum. In 1850 the consumption in Great Britain amounted to 31,226,840 lbs., or 1-13 lb. per head of the population of Great Britain and Ireland ; less than half that of tea. In North America the quantity of coffee consumed is four times that of tea. 3,000,000?. is paid annually for coffee in Great Britain. The use of chicory with coffee, which is extensively adopted on the Continent, does not lessen the consumption. The consumption of coffee is declining at present in England, pre- ference heing given to tea, which is moreover found more economical. — Ed.) THE SUGAB-CAIJE. 163 CHAPTEE XIX. THE S V G A B-C A N B. The attention we have directed in the foregoing chapter to the history of the coffee-plant, has afforded us an oppor- tunity of seeing how the spread of a plant which yields a product useful to man makes itself felt in trade and daily life. We have a still more remarkable example of this hi the sugar-cane, the use of which is still more extensive than that of coffee, and the history of which is connected with some of the most notable occurrences in the history of man- kind. Among all the various groups of plants none is so important to man as that of the grasses. To this belong the northern grains, which furnish the inhabitants of the temperate zone with their bread and the most important articles of vegetable food, as also with beer and spirits. Bice and maize also belong to it, the plants which yield the most important arti- cles of food and strong drinks hi the torrid zone. The food of domestic animals is chiefly furnished by grasses, and in this way they constitute also the basis of cattle-feeding as they do of agriculture. The Sugar-eane likewise belongs to this family, of so much importance to man. Like the other kinds of grasses it has a halm, composed of joints, but it is one of the largest species of this family, since the cane may grow from six to teu feet high and from one to four inches diameter. The leaves, as is usual among the grasses, are very narrow and long, and are distinguishable in this species by a longitudinal white streak. The flowers grow in a spreading panicle, as in the oat ; they are formed simply of green membranous scales, but are clothed with long, fine, and silky hair. In its existing distribution the cultivation of the sugar- cane is at home in the torrid zone,, but in China it goes to about 30° N. L., and in North America as far as 32° ; in Africa, if we include a few plantations in Madeira and Egypt, in like manner as far as 32° ; and if we determine the north limit according to its occurrence in single gardens in Spain m2 164 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. and Sicily, it mil here lie at 37° — 38°. In the southern hemi- sphere the cultivation of sugar scarcely goes further than to the tropic, for the Cape, Australia, and Buenos Ayres, pro- duce no sugar. Within the tropics the sugar-cane is cultivated in all four quarters of the globe. In America it occurs at a consider- able height above the sea, namely, up to 4000 feet, and indeed, ih particular places, under favourable circumstances, even over 6000 feet, especially on the elevated plateaux of Mexico. In Nepal it extends up to 4500 feet. The cane thrives best in a mean temperature of 77°— 84° Pah., but it succeeds even at 66° — 68°. The ancient Greeks and Romans were unacquainted with the general use of sugar. According to Pliny, saccharum was pro- duced in India and Arabia Felix, and was a kind of honey, which collected on canes, was white, like honey, crumbled be- tween the teeth, the largest pieces being of the size of a hazel- nut ; it was used in medicine. As this seems to refer to a juice which crystallised in or upon canes, some have thought that tabasheer was meant, this substance sometimes occurring crystallised in the joints of the bamboo-cane. The accounts of other authors, Lucan, Seneca, Eratosthenes, Strabo, and Dioscorides, are imperfect, but can be better referred to cane- sugar, and Pliny's account may easily have been incorrect. But if cane-sugar was really meant, it is evident that it was little known, or only as a medicinal substance to the Greeks and Eomans. On the other hand, the use of sugar appears to be of the greatest antiquity in China ; perhaps this is true also of India : Cochin China and India are the countries usually cited as the native homes of the sugar-cane, as the countries in which it is found wild ; nevertheless, a recent work (Roxburgh's " Flora Indica") states, "where it grows wild in the East Indies, is unknown to me." It is unknown when it came from India to Arabia, but it spread itself by this path over the west. The conquests of the Arabs caused the extension of the cultivation of the sugar-cane, in the ninth century, to Rhodes, Cyprus, Crete, and Sicily — nay, even to Calabria and Spain. The Crusades also contributed to increase the acquaintance of Europeans with sugar, and by degrees the most important commercial people of that time, the Venetians and Amalfians, began to import sugar, THE STJGAK-CA.NE. 165 chiefly from Egypt, into Western Europe. Prince Henry the Navigator carried the sugar-cane from Sicily to Madeira ; toward the end of the fifteenth and the commencement of the sixteenth century it was conveyed to the Canary Isles, where plantations were established, especially on Gran Ca- naria. The cultivation of sugar became even very consider- able in those islands, and was carried on there at that time with negro slaves. But very soon afterwards, at the com- mencement of the sixteenth century, the sugar-cane had been brought to St. Domingo, and the cultivation of sugar there was before long found so much more profitable, that it gradually diminished in the Canaries, Madeira, Spain, Calabria, Sicily, and the Greek Islands, and finally ceased. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries the culture of sugar spread to Cuba and the rest of the West India Islands, and was one of the most important causes of the extensive trade in the negroes of Africa ; it also became diffused over the continent of America, Mexico, Brazil, and Guiana. These parts of the continent now present themselves as competitors, and pro- bably will hereafter obtain a preponderance over the islands, because the soil is less exhausted, labour and fuel are cheaper, population is greater, and capital is present in greater abun- dance ; the cultivation of sugar will therefore migrate still further toward the west. That which at present keeps back the competition is the want of good machinery and canals, a want which time can satisfy. A circumstance which greatly furthers the increase of sugar cultivation is the fact that the sugar-cane gives a greater profit on the same area than most other agricultural products. The proportion between it and wheat is as eight to one ; but it must not be over- looked that the cost of establishing and maintaining a sugar- plantation and the preparation of the sugar, is very much greater. All the sugar which France used in 1 804 might have been grown on an area of seven square leagues. In Louisiana and Florida the cultivation of sugar has also greatly increased, through which the slave-trade has become very active there, and it has caused the people of Virginia and Carolina to provide themselves with more negroes, like any other " domestic cattle," for the purpose of sending to those more southern provinces, where, however, many fall victims to the unhealthy climate. In the East Indies, where the cultivation of sugar is old, it has nevertheless only begun 166 THE EAKTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. to increase considerably of late years ; "but it will perhaps go on enlarging there, because the price of labour is small com- pared with that which is subject to the cost of purchase and maintenance of negroes. The cultivation of sugar has spread in the South Sea Islands, especially in Tahiti. The sugar-cane growing wild in Tahiti is somewhat different from the ordinary plant ; it was brought by Bougainville and Bligh from Tahiti to the Antilles, where it is now. generally cultivated. In the years 1828 — 1830, the average annual exports were: from the A¥est Indies, 766,000,000 lbs.; from Brazil, 140,000,000 lbs.; from Bengal, Jana, Bourbon, 60,000,000 lbs. ; Mauritius, 50,000,000 lbs. ; making to- gether, 1,016,000,000 lbs. Of this, 70,000,000 lbs. go to North America, so that about 950,000,000 lbs. come to Europe. The European country using most sugar is Great Britain. In 1840, 360,000,000 lbs. were consumed there, which gives more than 20 lbs. of sugar for every consumer. This great consumption depends upon the general welfare and the better condition in which the lower classes stand. The consumption has greatly increased during the last century, although not in the same proportion as that of coffee. In the year 1700, it amounted to 20,000,000 lbs. ; in 1782, to 155,000,000 lbs. ; in the year 1828, to 352,000,000 lbs. Before 1700 very little sugar was used ; it was an article which only made its appearance on the tables of the great. Its use was greatly increased as tea gradually became a general beverage in England. The consumption would cer- tainly be still greater in England, if the duty were lower. The consumption in Prance is much smaller, being only 1\ lbs. of sugar, of which 2-^ lbs. are beet-sugar, per head ;* Russia consumes the smallest quantity, among the European States. According to an average of the years 1832-1838, the an- nual consumption in Denmark (excluding the duchies) is * Humboldt, Voyage xii. (1828), assumes the consumption of raw sugar in France at 56,000,000 or 60,000,000 kilogrammes, and the number of inhabitants as 30,000,000 ; this gives about 4 lbs. of sugar for each person. According to the " Nouvelles Annates des Voyages" June, 1834, the consumption amounted to 80,000,000 kilogrammes, or 160,000,000 lbs., in 1821, the proportion of which to 32,000,000 of inhabitants makes 5 lbs. for each person. Under Henry TV. the use of sugar was so rare in France that it was sold by the ounce by apothecaries. THE 8UGAB-CANE. 167 9,000,000 lbs., which divided by the population, gives 7^ lbs. for each person. In the German Customs Union, the consumption is esti- mated at 5 lbs. ; in the whole of Germany, at 6 lbs. ; in Nor- way and Sweden, at only 3£ lbs. ; in the Austrian States and in Eussia, at 1£ lbs. per head. It is well known that sugar may be prepared from many other plants besides the sugar-cane. But there are only two of sufficient importance to deserve mention here ; they have acquired an increased interest through two attempts to oppose the use of cane-sugar, which derived their origin from most diverse motives ; one decidedly from philanthropic considerations, the other had its chief cause in ambition. The Quakers of North America found it opposed to their consciences to use sugar produced by means of slaves, be- cause in this way they indirectly contributed to maintain and increase slavery and the slave-trade. They found a substitute in the sap of the sugar-maple (Acer sacchwrmum), a North American tree, which, like the European birch, contains in spring an abundant store of sweet sap, from which sugar can be prepared by boiling down. Although this is used to a not inconsiderable extent in the North American States, it equals scarcely more than an eighth or a ninth of the con- sumption of cane-sugar in the whole of North America. When we consider this, and, moreover, that this sap yields only 1\ per cent, of sugar, while the juice of the sugar-cane gives 12 to 16 per cent., it is very evident that it cannot be expected that maple-sugar can ever be dangerous to the trade in cane-sugar, or to its production in those countries where the climate is adapted to it. When Napoleon formed the gigantic, but neither practic- able nor liberal idea, of stopping all intercourse between the continent of Europe and Great Britain, in order to destroy the commerce of that country, it was necessary to look for a substitute for this important colonial product, only to be ob- tained on the Continent by the help of an open trade. The discovery that sugar might be manufactured from the juice of the beet-root, was therefore, of course, very welcome to him. He made every effort to stimulate the agriculturists to grow this plant ; he encouraged the chemists to contrive the best methods of preparing the sugar, and of applying the refining 168 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. process to it. In 1810 there existed 200 beet-root manu- factories, which annually delivered 2,000,000 lbs. of sugar; but still this was only Jg of the consumption in France. After the West Indian sugar could again be introduced, the sale of beet-root sugar decreased ; but its production subse- quently increased in an extraordinary degree, through im- provements in the manufacture and its combination with agri- cultural systems, and yielded annually about 24,000,000 lbs. It has again decreased in France since a tax has been laid upon beet-root sugar. It has at the same time extended over other European countries, Belgium and Germany. Negro-slavery, it is well known, has been abolished in the British West Indies ; the parliament voted 20,000,000Z. ster- ling as a compensation to the planters, and thereby gave a brilliant example of how a nation, as such, can act from mo- tives which lie beyond the sphere of egotism. The result of emancipation, which is now embraced by the Danish islands also, as is well known, has been more success- ful than was expected, yet at the same time very different according to the different characters of the islands ; more favourable in the highly cultivated than in the mountainous islands, in which the negroes can establish themselves in- dependently more readily than where the land has been taken possession of and they are compelled to take work from the planters. Among the great results were the in- creased use of draught-oxen, of machinery, and steam, and improvement in the refining. But if the cultivation of sugar should decrease considerably in the West Indies, it will probably increase on the continents of North and South America, where climate and other circumstances facilitate the cultivation of sugar, and where the emancipation will also make its way in the course of time. In no case will Europe be destitute of sugar ; at the very worst the price may rise for a time, but certainly only temporarily. But who among us will not gladly pay somewhat more for sugar when we know that this is a contribution towards the abolition of an institution which is a disgrace to humanity- — a disgrace to every century that endures it ? THE TINE. 169 CHAPTER XX. THE VINE. The two cultivated plants whose geography and history I have just been dealing with, the coffee-tree and the sugar- cane, yield products which belong to the alimentary sub- stances of recent times, for in antiquity they were un- known, and only very little heard of in the middle ages. The vine, the history of which is to be the subject of the present essay, yields us a gift the use of which is as ancient as the oldest historical records, nay more, is connected with the oldest traditions and myths. The use of coffee and sugar, and the sphere of the cultivation of these two plants, have increased in an extraordinary extent in the most recent times, and continue to increase in a greatly advancing proportion ; the culture of the vine and the use of wine spread but slowly. The coffee-tree and sugar-cane belong to the torrid zone ; the vine to the warmer parts of the temperate zone. Every one knows this plant ; remembers the curved rough stem, the twisted branches, the handsome three or five lobed leaves, the tendrils (which are barren flower-stalks), the in- auspicious green flowers, and the beautiful bunches of grapes. In the most ancient myths, Dionysios, Bacchus, and Osyris occur as gods of wine, and as dispensers and diffusers of it ; yet although these myths may have some connexion with the native home and with the cultivation of the vine, as well as with the diffusion of the use of wine, they are obscure, and present themselves under such various forms that it is scarcely possible to find in them a contribution to the history of the vine and wine. The native country of the vine cannot be well ascertained, but it is probable that it must be sought in Mingrelia and Georgia, and in the regions between Caucasus, Ararat, and Taurus ; for according to Tournefort, Guldenstedt, Bieber- stein, and Parrot, it grows wild there, in extreme abundance, in all the woods. It does indeed also occur wild in Greece and Italy, indeed even in the south of Prance ; I have myself met with it frequent and luxuriant in this condition in many places in Sicily and Calabria ; but according to the reports of 170 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. the travellers above mentioned it appears to be still more common in the more Eastern countries, and to be found more frequently and in greater luxuriance in proportion to the proximity to them ; whence these would certainly be most correctly supposed to be the home of the vine, while those ex- amples which occur at a great distance from them in a wild , state, must be regarded rather as outcasts from cultivation. The wide diffusion of the vine in Asia Minor and the Greek Islands before the Homeric period, is proved by many pas- sages in the Homeric hymns. The shield of Achilles repre- sented a vine-gathering, the grapes in the garden of Alcinous yielded rich wine abundantly, &c. Herodotus and Theo- phrastus speak of the cultivation of wine in Egypt, and in the very oldest Greek tombs are found pictures representing the vine-harvest. The cultivation of the vine seems to have come somewhat later into Italy. Pliny relates that wine was scarce in the earlier times of Rome, and cites as a proof of this that Ro- mulus sacrificed to the gods with milk instead of wine, as also that Numa Pompilius on the same grounds forbade the offer- ing of wine at the burning of the dead, a custom otherwise general in antiquity. Pliny speaks of the moderation which prevailed in the use of wine in the earlier days of Rome, and mentions, in reference to this, that it was forbidden young ladies to drink wine ; that a Roman lady was judged to have forfeited her dowry because she had drunk more wine than her health required, without her husband's permission ; nay more, that a man was pardoned for killing his wife because he came upon her as she was in the act of drinking from a wine-vessel ; that Cato thought it was the careful control of the conduct of young girls in this respect which gave rise to the right every Roman possessed to kiss his female relations. What iElian relates in regard to this is remarkable : that no youth of noble parentage was allowed to drink wine before his thirty-fifth year. In after times, however, the use of wine became very great, and the luxury in foreign and rare kinds of wine considerable, amoDg the Romans. The cultivation of the vine seems to have commenced at a very early period in the south of Prance, for the Phocians who founded Marseilles are supposed to have brought the vine with them 600 years before the birth of Christ. But THE TINE. 171 this could not Lave been very extensive at first, for Varro says (72 b.c.) that no vine-culture was found in Gaul beyond the Alps ; while both Livy and Pliny relate that it was wine in particular which allured the Gauls to cross the Alps and make incursions in Italy. Notwithstanding that these at- tacks were made on Pliny's native land, he thinks that the effort to acquire such an important possession might well excuse a war of invasion. It is a well-known assertion that the Cimbri also crossed the Alps for the same reason. By degrees the cultivation of the vine spread in Gaul ; Pliny speaks of the wine in the coiintry of the Bituriges (now Bordeaits) ; but the Emperor Domitian promulgated a law which importantly limited the culture of the vine ; for a year having occurred in which there was great failure of the corn, and a great superabundance of wine, he commanded that no new vineyards should be established in Italy, and that in the provinces one-half of the existing vines should be eradicated. The command excited universal discontent, and was the more absurd that wine and corn require different soils and different local conditions.* This decree of Domitian's was not indeed rigidly enforced, but it did certainly exercise considerable influence, for two centuries later the Emperor Probus granted permission to plant wines in Gaul. This emperor also al- lowed his soldiers to establish vineyards in Hungary and on the Rhine, and from that time forwards, therefore (from the third century), Germany has been a wine country. t The narrative even contains the remark that Probus gave permis- sion to plant wine in England ; yet it is possible that the same happened here as with the Papal rescripts of the thir- teenth century, by which the monasteries in Denmark were confirmed in their possession of vineyards, notwithstanding that historians are totally silent as to wine-culture in Den- mark. It must have been a result, namely, of ignorance of the climatal conditions of the distant countries, causing per- * Absurd as such a decree is, it was repeated by Charles IX., who, on the oc- casion of a failure of the corn crop, commanded that no one should plant more than a third part of his fields with vines ; nay, even in 1731, Louis XV. forbade the establishment of new vineyards. t The merits of Probus in this respect were unfolded in a humorous manner in an essay, about 100 years old, in which the author proposed to canonize him, and to drive some other saint out of the calendar to make room for one who deserved so welL 172 THE EARTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. mission to be granted which circumstances rendered useless. On the other hand it must not be overlooked, that various documents of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries testify that wine was grown at that time in the south of England, as was also the case in the north-west part of France (Brit- tany and Normandy), where it is not cultivated now, any more than in England. But we are not warranted in con- cluding from this that the climate of that country is altered, for the question arises what kind of wine it was, whether it may not have been somewhat of that sort of which the poet says: You call it wine ! The name is fine, But it gladdeneth not this heart of mine.* The following anecdote renders it highly probable that the wine was of this kind. A noble of Brittany was praising his native province at the court of Erancis I., and boasted that three things were better there than in any other part of Erance — the men, the dogs, and the wine ; to which Erancis answered : " As to the first two, it is very possible ; but as to the wine, I must own it is the sourest and worst in the whole kingdom." By degrees good cyder and good beer came to be preferred in these regions to the bad native wine, or wine was introduced from other districts ; in this way the vineyards of north-western Erance and of England vanished, and the limit of the vine was driven further south. Even in the east of Germany the vine-limit was further north for- merly, as high as 53°. In another part of the temperate zone also has the cultivation of the vine either disappeared or be- come diminished, namely, in the north of Africa and Western Asia, on account of Mahomet prohibiting the use of wine to the followers of his religion. On the other hand, vine-culture has been spread in other parts of the world through European colonies ; the vine was transplanted from Crete to Madeira and Teneriffe, which at present furnish such esteemed wines ; vineyards were es- tablished in the Cape Colonies, and Cape Constantia from there, is known as an excellent land. Swiss colonists planted * Heisst wein 1st aber kein Man kann dabei nicht frohlich seyn. THE TINE. 173 vineyards in the interior of North America, at Vevais in Ohio, and several other places. The vine has also been transplanted into the temperate parts of South America (Buenos Ayres and the south of Chili) and into Australia. Looking to the present geographical distribution of the cultivation of the vine, we find the northern limit on the west coast of Europe, at the mouth of the Loire, at 47^° N. L. ; in the interior of Erance it rises and comes to 49° at Paris ; then it advances in Champagne, and goes on beyond toward the east, still further to the north at the junction of the Moselle with the Shine, 51° ; in Saxony, Thuringia, Silesia, and Prussia, wine is grown in isolated spots as far as 51°, but this is so mediocre that it is better to exclude those points. Taken strictly, the vine-culture of Germany is limited to the valley of the Rhine and its side-valleys, those of the Maine, Neckar, and Moselle, and to the valley of the Danube. Hungary has vineyards at 48° — 49°, the south-ivest of Russia (Zarizin) and the Crimea up to the same latitude, and the vine also succeeds on the north side of the Caspian Sea, at Astrachan, in 46°. We see therefore that, although the climate becomes con- stantly colder toward the east, the northern boundary of wine sinks very little from the Rhine, and is at Astrachan almost as northerly as at the mouth of the Loire. The cause of this must be sought in the fact that the culture of the vine is chiefly dependent upon the summer being warm enough to ripen the grapes. Since, then, the summer temperature of the coast countries is not so considerable as that of the inland regions, the northern boundary necessarily sinks towards the Atlantic Ocean. Eastward of the Caspian Sea, wine is still grown in Bok- hara, and likewise in the elevated plateaux of Persia, where the Shiraz wine is famed, and on the south terraces of the Himalaya mountains, in Cabul and Cashmeer. But when we descend to the plains of India or to the coast border of Persia, we either miss the vine-culture or it is found inconsiderable. At Abuchaer, in Persia (29°), it is requisite to dig pits six to ten feet deep in the earth, to protect the vines from the over- powering heat of the sun. In China the cultivation of the vine is of great antiquity, but yet not of very great extent, and it has been almost annihilated several times. In Japan, 174 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. again, it is inconsiderable. On the west side of Africa, the island of Ferro (27^°) is taken as the south limit. It is true that the vine is cultivated in many places within the torrid zone, but this is for the sake of the grapes, and not in order to make wine. When the heat is too great, the grapes be- come dried up, the tendrils shoot out too luxuriantly, and the grapes are produced too frequently ; for in the tropics several crops of ripe grapes are obtained from the same vine within the year. In North America the growth of wine is on the whole in- considerable, but it increases in Louisiana and in several southern provinces ; it extends northward as far as 38° — 40° N. L., and it is not found southward of the tropic here. The regions in which wine is produced in the southern hemisphere, namely, on the River Plate, in Chili, at the Cape,, and in Australia, all lie in the temperate zone or close to it ; the south limit in Chili is in Valdivia, 40°. When we ascend to a certain elevation in the wine countries, the vine is found to cease, because the climate becomes too severe. In Wurtemburg it ceases at 1000 — 1500 feet; in the north of Switzerland, about 1700 feet ; on the south side of the Alps, at 2000 feet ; in the Apennines and in Sicily, at 2000—3000 feet ; at Teneriffe, at 2500 feet ; in the Himalaya mountains, at 10,000 feet. France is the country which produces the greatest quan- tity, and taken altogether the best wines. Italy, Spain, and Greece, have, it is true, certain good kinds of. wine, but the common wine is not good. The cause of this difference is, that in France more industry is applied, not only in the cultivation, but in the gathering of the grapes and the management of the wine. It is remarkable that some of the best wines, like Burgundy, are grown near the north limit of the vine-culture. The vine thrives in very varied soils, and may be excellent in different earths. It has been thought that volcanic soil is peculiarly favourable, and aa examples of this, are cited the laerymas Christi of Vesuvius, the excellent wine of Etna, Madeira, and Tokay. But champagne grows upon chalk, the wines of Bordeaux and the south of France upon an argillaceous gravel, several FJrine wines upon clay-slate, &c. If the volcanic soils have some advantages, the cause hardly THE TINE. 175 lies, as some have supposed, in the internal heat of the ground, but in the dark colour, which increases the heat derived from the sun. I have seen on Etna, at an elevation of 2000 feet, vines planted in pots which were filled with the black, sterile volcanic ashes mixed with garden earth. In marshy or damp soils alone the vine will not thrive at all. Tet although the vine will thrive in almost every soil, the special nature of the soil undoubtedly has a very remark- able influence upon the particular character of the wine, for we cannot well otherwise explain the circumstance that cer- tain kinds of wine are limited, not only to a certain province or district, as Champagne, Burgundy, and the Rhenish wines, but even to very narrowly circumscribed estates, such as Tokay, Constantia, Johannisberger, &c, out of which the same wine is not obtained, even from the same variety of the vine when transplanted. The peculiar characters of different wines have given rise to some remarkable literary productions, I mean the learned wine-battles which have taken place, especially in Prance. The most remarkable combat, perhaps, is that which was carried on in the time of Louis XIV., between Champagne and Burgundy. Coffin, rector of the University of Beauvais, fought for the Champagne, and wrote a spirited Latin ode, which gained this wine a complete victory over the Burgundy, which was defended in a dull poem by Greneau. The victor re- ceived in payment an abundant quantity of the wine he had celebrated, from the citizens of Rheims, in which city the chief wine-trade of Champagne was carried on. Whoever is impartial enough to desire to know what can be said against Champagne, may read a spirited harangue in Tieck's novel, " Die G-emalde." The vine is sometimes grown dwarf, fastened to short stakes rising but a few feet from the ground, in the most northern districts even but a few inches, as in the Rhine countries, in France, and in Spain ; sometimes it is trained over trees of ten or fifteen feet high, between which the tendrils hang down in festoons, beautifying the landscape ; this is the usual mode in Italy and Sicily ; sometimes the vines are even suffered to climb up tall trees. This can only be the case in warm climates, for otherwise the branches and leaves of the trees would rob the grapes of the necessary sun- 176 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. light. The reason why this method is most frequently adopted in Italy, is that the soil beneath can then be used for corn or pulses, and at the same time the wood of the elms or poplars to which the vines are attached. The wine is gene- rally inferior under these circumstances, partly because the plants are deprived of sunlight, and partly because the soil is too much exhausted by the excessive crops. The vine sometimes attains a very great size and fertility. Audibert speaks of a vine in Prance, the stem of which was as thick as a man's body, and of which the crop gave 350 bottles of wine. In the gardens at Hampton Court Palace there is an exceedingly large vine, filling by itself a very large hot-house. The players of Drury Lane Theatre having once greatly- pleased King George the Third, he gave permission that the gardener should cut them off 100 dozen bunches of grapes, if there were as many upon the vine. The gardener not only cut off this number of bunches, but sent word to the king that he could cut off as many more without entirely stripping the tree. The greatest number of bunches which have been cut from one and the same vine in the Eosenberg Garden at Copenhagen, amounted to 419, the total weight of which was about 650 lb. ; the largest bunch weighed more than 2 lb. 10 oz. In the south of Prance there were said to be instances of bunches of grapes, weighing from 6 lbs. to 10 lbs. ; a traveller in Palestine relates that they are to be met with there up to 17 lbs. ; not to mention the bunches which the spies of the Jews brought back from the Land of Promise. THE TEA-SHETJB. 177 CHAPTEE XXI. THE TEA-SHRUB. The tea-plant is alow shrub, which when left to itself may attain a height of 10 feet or 12 feet, but in cultivation gene- rally grows only to 5 feet or 6 feet, in some places even only 2-| feet to 3 feet high ; it is kept thus low in order to make it push out more-shoots, and to facilitate the gathering ; it bears longish lance-shaped, toothed, shining evergreen leaves, and flowers, in the axils, with a five or six leaved calyx, a six or nine leaved corolla of a white colour, and numerous stamens. The fruit is a three-lobed capsule, with separate cavities ; in each chamber there is one seed, with a hard nut-like shell. Camellia is the genus nearest allied to it. The tribe to which these two genera belong is called that of the Camelliea?. It is not yet fully made out whether there is but one, or are several species of tea, and particularly whether the green and the black tea are obtained from two different species or two varieties, or whether the difference between them de- pends merely upon the different modes of management ; but at present most botanists, as well those who have been in the native country of the tea as those in Europe who have ex- amined the shrub growing here or dried specimens, are of opinion that all kinds of tea come from one species. The most active opposer of this opinion, however, is Reeves, the for- mer tea-taster of the English East India Company in Canton.* The countries in which tea is grown are China and Japan. In the north of China, for instance near Pekin, the tea- shrub will live in the open air, but the tea is not good, so that it does not pay to cultivate it on a large scale. It is in like manner only in the southern parts, of the Japanese empire that the growth of tea is important. But while too cold, a climate is disadvantageous to the tea-shrub, the same seems to be true of a too warm one. In Tonquin and Cochin-China, tea-growing is still met with, but it is not very extensive, and the product is not good ; in like manner, (* According to Dr. Eoyle, there are two Chinese species, while the Assam species seems also to be distinct. — Ed.) 178 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. most of the experiments which have been made to cultivate tea in the torrid zone, have failed. The extreme limits of the cultivation of tea in Eastern Asia, if we determine them according to where the tea-shrub thrives in the open air, are the 15° and 40° N. L. ; but if we speak of the profitable cultivation, the zone is restricted between 23° and 31° (from Yunan to somewhat to the south of Nankin) in China, and between 30° and 35° in Japan. Toward the east, the area of distribution of tea is limited by the Southern Ocean ; toward the west, it does not extend further than the limits of Thibet. In Assam, at 25°— 26° N. L., and at a mean elevation of 2000-4000 feet, a wild shrub has been discovered, which Dr. "Wallieh recognised as the true (?) tea, and the cultivation of tea has been commenced there.* Among the recent attempts to introduce the cultivation of tea into other parts of, the globe, are those which were made in Bio Janeiro, where a tolerably large tract was planted with it, and Chinese colonists were brought to cultivate and pre- pare the tea ; but the tea grown there is coarse and destitute of the delicate aromatic odour of the Chinese tea, and be- sides, the price of labour is too high ; the Chinese have, therefore, gradually become scattered, and the plantation may be regarded as a failure. The experiments made recently in Java (probably at some height above the sea in this mountainous country) have been more fortunate. Nearly 1,500,000 lbs. of Javanese tea are said to have been imported into Amsterdam in one year.t The tea-bush is indigenous only in China, and, according to recent discoveries, in Assam, on the borders of China ; not, however, in Japan, for the Japanese history mentions the Chinese bonzes who brought the tea-shrub into that country. This must have happened before the tenth century (a.d.), for mention was made of it in Japan in the com- mencement of that century. Perhaps it was in use even in the sixth century. The accounts of its cultivation in China go still further back. It is related that in the sixth century a physician recommended it to the emperor as a remedy for (* Also in the Himalayas, where it is likely to prove very important.— Ed.) t Meyen, Geography of Plants. THE TEA-SHRUB. 179 the headache, and he is stated to have been highly regarded on this account ; and even in the fourth century it is men- tioned that a minister drank tea. A tax was laid upon tea for the first time, in China, toward the end of the eighth century. The Japanese have a myth respecting the origin of this important plant. A Buddhist saint, Darma, came from India to China, with the intention of spreading his doctrines in that country ; to strengthen him in his mission, and to give distinction to his religion, he made a vow to pass night and day in uninterrupted religious exercises, but sleep at length overtook him. When he awoke, in anger at his fault and in atonement for his broken vow, he cut off his eyelids, and threw them on the ground ; but these grew up into a plant wholly unknown before, the leaves of which he tasted, after which he felt strengthened, and in a condition to withstand sleep better. He recommended this valuable plant to his disciples, chiefly with a view to the same ascetic purposes. It is evident at once that the myth contains a symbolical indication of the effects of tea upon the nerves. This Darma is an historical personage, who lived in the sixth century. The tea-shrub thrives best on the south side of hills, and in the vicinity of rivers and brooks. It is cultivated in large or small plantations, where the shrubs stand in regular rows, but in Japan they are also found growing as hedges along the boundaries of the fields, for the domestic consumption of the owner. The shrub is increased by seeds, and is cut down, appa- rently in order to make it branch sufficiently. In the third year the leaves may be used, and at the seventh year the shrub must be removed and replaced by a new one, to secure a good crop. Manure is applied ; in Japan oil-cake is used, with dried sardines and the juice of mustard-seed. The leaves are gathered at three separate times of the year : in February or March, when the delicate, scarcely un- folded shoots are picked ; in April, at which time older leaves and new delicate shoots are gathered, these being sorted ac- cording to the delicacy of the leaves ; and finally in May and June, at which season the coarsest leaves are removed, which, however, are likewise sorted. The first gathering yields the finest tea (" Emperor Tea," in Japan), and this is pulverised n2 3 80 THE EARTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. after being dried. The leaves are pulled off, each separately, either from the bush itself or from the branches carried home. If we may believe some accounts, there is a peculiar mode of gathering a certain wild kind of tea, which grows on steep, inaccessible cliffs. This gathering is stated to be made by monkeys, which are trained to it, or according to others (less probably), in the following way: the monkeys found on the bushes are excited by throwing stones, &c, and they then throw the branches down at the Chinese. After the leaves are gathered, they are dried, by laying them in iron pans placed over a fire in little stoves. Great care is required to dry them without burning, and it is re- peated several times. A man stands at each pan, turning the leaves over with his bare hand. Each time that they .are taken from the pan, they arc rolled in the hand, and in this way the tea-leaves acquire the form in which they are met with in trade. If this process alone is employed, it is called the dry way ; the wet way is as follows : the tea-leaves are first placed in an iron sieve, and held over boiling water, the vapour of which rises into the sieve, penetrates and changes the leaves, after which they are dried in the same way as before. According to some accounts, green tea is produced by the first process of drying, black tea by the second ; but Siebold seems to have entertained the opposite opinion of the matter.* The dried tea-leaves are then either packed in this con- dition in stoneware jars or leaded chests, or they are made (* Mr. Fortune, who has visited many parts of the Chinese coast, states that there are two species of tea-plant, Thea bohea, from which both black and green lea are made in the southern provinces ; while Titan vh-idis alone is grown in the northern provinces, and in like manner constitutes the material for both kinds of tea ; but as Dr. Royle observes, it is quite possible that the Chinese may prefer varieties of the same plant, in particular soils and situations, for the preparation of particular varieties of both black and green tea. The following is the account of the modes of preparing teas, by Mr. Ball, late inspector of teas to the East India Company in China :t In the manufacture of black tea, the leaves are exposed to the air after gathering, so that they lose their natural crispness, and become soft and flaccid; 'they are kept in this state until they begin to emit a slight fragrance, upon which they are sifted, and tossed about with the hands in large trays ; the leaves in each sieve are then collected into a heap, and covered with a cloth. They are then watched with the utmost care, until they become spotted and tinged with red, at the same time increasing in fragrance; they must be then instantly roasted, or the tea would be injured. In the first roasting of all black tea, the t " An Account of the Cultivation and Manufacture of Tea in China." THE TEA-SHEUB. 181 into a kind of cake by the aid of ox's or sheep's blood, or fat (the brick-tea, as it is called, which is very extensively used fire is prepared with dry wood, and kept exceedingly brisk ; any heat which will produce the crackling of the leaves described by Kajmpfer suffices The roasting must be continued until tiie leaves give out a fragrant smell, and become quite soft and flaccid, when they are in a fit state to be rolled. The roasting and rolling are repeated, often a third, and with large and fleshy leaves, sometimes even a fourth time ; and it is only when juices can no longer be freely expressed in the process of rolling, that the leaves are considered to be in a fit state to undergo the final drying, in sieves placed in the drying-tubs, above a charcoal fire, in a common chafing-dish. During this process they begin to assume then- black appearance. A considerable quantity of moisture is dissipated, and the fire is then covered with the ash of charcoal, or burnt rice-husks, whicli both moderates the heat and prevents smoke. The leaves are then twisted, and again undergo the process of drying, twisting, and turning, as before ; which is repeated once or twice more, until they become quite black, well twisted, and perfectly dry and'crisp. Of green tea, there are only two gatherings, the first about the 20th of April, the second at the summer solstice. The green-tea factors universally agree, that the sooner the leaves of green teas arc roasted after gathering, the better ; and that all exposure to the air is unnecessary, and to the sun injurious. The iron vessel (called a huo) in which the tea is roasted is thin, about sixteen inches in diameter, and set horizontally in a stove of brickwork, so as to have a depth of about fifteen inches. The fire is prepared with dry wood, and kept very brisk; the heat becomes intolerable, and the bottom of the kw even red hot, thougli this is not essential. About half a pound of leaves are put in at a time ; a crack- ling noise is produced, much steam is evolved from the leaves, which are quickly stirred about ; at the end of every turn they are raised about six inches above the surface of the stove, and shaken on the palm of the hand, so as to separate them, and to disperse the steam. They are then suddenly collected into a heap, and passed to another man, who stands in readiness with a basket to receive them. The process of rolling is much the same as that employed in the rolling of black tea, the leaves taking the form of a ball. After the balls arc shaken to pieces, the leaves are also rolled between the palms of the hands, so that they maybe twisted regularly and in the same direction. They are then spread out in sieves, and placed on stands in a cool room. For the second roasting the fire is considerably diminished, and charcoal used instead of wood, and the leaves are constantly fanned by a boy who stands near. When the leaves have lost so much of their aqueous and viscous qualities as to produce no sensible steam, they no longer adhere together, but by the simple action of the fire, separate and curl of themselves. When taken from the bio, they are of a dark olive colour, almost black. After being sifted, they are placed on stands as before. For the third roasting, which is in fact the final drying, the heat is not greater than what the hand can bear for some seconds without inconvenience. The fanning and mode of roasting are the same as in the final part of the second roasting. " It was now curious to observe the change of colour which gradually tock place in the leaves, for it was in this roasting that they began to assume that bluish tint, resembling the bloom on fruit, which distinguishes this tea, and renders its appear- ance so agreeable." The foregoing being the general mode of manufacturing green or hyson tea, it is separated into different varieties, as hyson, hyson-skin, young hyson, and 182 THE EARTH, PLANTS, AND MAN". in the north of Asia) ; in the south-west of China, the tea also occurs in round balls, which are sent to Ava and Cochin- China. Sometimes sweet-scented flowers are mixed with the tea, for example, Camellia Sasanqua and Olea fragrans ; but it is quite a mistake to suppose that the peculiar aromatic odour is due to these, and not to the tea itself. The tea is bought from the producers by small traders, and brought by them to the great merchants in Canton (the Hong merchants).* The following are the different lines of trade: 1. Seawards, in reference to China, hitherto almost-exclu- sively from Canton to Europe, North America, some to India, as well as to the Indian islands. The English are the most important traders ; next to them come the Dutch and the North Americans. 2. Overland toward the north, through the Desert Gobi, over Kiachta to Siberia, and from thence partly to Europe. This trade has increased extremely in the last twenty or thirty years. Timkovsky met with many caravans in his journey, each with 100, 200, and 250 camel-loads of tea. gunpowder, by sifting, winnowing, and fanning, and some varieties by further roasting. It is stated by Mr. Ball, that the peculiar colour of green tea does not arise properly from the admixture of colouring-matter with the leaves, but naturally out of the process of manipulation ; and from some experiments which he made, it appeared that leaves, while undergoing the third roasting in the same vessel, but kept separate by a thin partition of wood, became of a black or a green colour, according as they were kept in a quiescent state or in constant motion. With regard to the colouring and adulteration of teas, much discussion has re- cently taken place, but the matter may be regarded as tolerably well settled by the investigations .of Mr. R. Warington, who lias lately read a paper on the sub- ject before the Chemical Society of London. Various travellers had stated that Prussian blue is used in the facing of green teas, while some had imagined the colouring matter to be indigo. Mr. Warington has shown that the substances used in facing green teas by the Chinese are Prussian blue, gypsum, and turme- ric; and he states, on the authority of Mr. Reeves, that they are used to suit the fancy of European merchants, as the dealers dislike the yellowish appearance of uncoloured green tea. " The small quantity employed to give the ' face' precludes the idea of adulteration as a source of profit." Mr, Warington has also shown that the Chinese prepare what they call Zae-teas to suit the low prices of the English merchants, selling them under this name. One specimen of black Lie-tea was found to be made up of tea-dust, dirt, and sand agglutinated into a mass with a gummy matter, and rolled into little balls to look like leaves, of which none whatever were included. The black Lie-teas are faced with black-lead, the green with Prussian blue, gypsum, and turmeric. — Ed.) (* In the treaty made after the late war, the British authorities stipulated that the monopoly of the Hong merchants should be abolished. — Ed.) THE TEA-SHBUB. 183 3. Overland toward the west, from the south-west pro- vinces of China towards Mongolia, Bokhara, and Persia. 4. Overland toward the south-west, from the south-west provinces of China toward Thibet, and the terraces of the Himalayas, Nepal, Butan, &c. 5. Overland southward to Ava and Cochin-China. Much tea is carried to the Burmese from the province of Tunan. In China and Japan, tea is, in the truest sense of the word, the national beverage, and has been at least for the last thou- sand years. It is used by all, from the emperor to the common people ; it is drunk at all meals and at all times of the day ; it is offered to visitors ; it is sold everywhere, in the streets and roads, in public-houses, like beer or wine in Europe. It is part of a good education to prepare tea and serve it with grace, this being taught by masters, as fencing and dancing are with us. The true connoisseur in tea can distinguish 700 kinds ; nay, it is said, he can even taste what wood was used to boil the water, and in what kind of vessel it was done. Both the Chinese and the Japanese drink it without milk and sugar ; sometimes, however, essences are added to it. It is taken either as an infusion of the leaves (as in Europe) or as a powder, upon which warm water is poured in cups, and stirred up till it froths. The consumption of tea among the many nomadic races of Northern and Central Asia is considerable. It renders the bad, saline waters of the steppes drinkable ; and tea is a strengthening, invigorating beverage to those who lead a wan- dering life in a dry, sharp atmosphere. Similar reasons have given rise to a large consumption in Thibet, where tea is drunk to assist the digestion of the dry barley-meal. Tea was unknown in Europe before the seventh century. Russia and Holland seem to have been the countries which first became acquainted with it. A Eussian embassy to Mongolia received tea in return for its presents, consisting of sable-furs ; a protest was made against such useless wares, but they were forced upon the ambassador, and when he brought the tea to Moscow, it met with approval. It is related by the Dutch, that in 1610 they carried to China, sage (a plant in high esteem for its medicinal properties in days of old), and exchanged this for tea. The Chinese soon discarded the sage, but the tea found a constantly increasing demand in Holland. 184 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. Tea was introduced into England somewhat later. In Pepys' Diary, of 1661, we find : " I sent for a cup of tea, a Chinese beverage, of which I had never drunk before." In 1664, the East India Company made the King of England a present of 2 lbs. of tea, and in 1667 a ship received orders to bring home 100 lbs. Tea appears to have been introduced into Denmark at about the same time. It met with an active opponent in the celebrated Danish botanist, Simon Pauli, who at first asserted that it was nothing else but the bog-myrtle (Myrica), and afterwards he made such constant representations against its use to Frederic the Third, whose body-physician he was, and who was fond of tea, that the king, one day, tired of his im- portunities, answered with the well-known equivoque, " Oredo te non esse sanum." A great difference prevails between the different countries of Europe in reference to the consumption of tea. The in- habitants of England use the greatest quantity,* then come Holland and the north. In France and Germany the con- sumption is but small, but has begun to increase in quite re- cent times ; in the south of Europe very little is consumed. "While in 1711 only 142,000 lbs. were consumed in Great Britain, the consumption in 1781 amounted to 3,500,000 lbs.; in 1785 (after the duty was reduced from 119 to 12-| per cent.), to 13,000,000 lbs. ; in 1801, to 20,000,000 lbs., and 3,500,000 lbs. for Ireland. The consumption has increased since then, for example, in 182S it was 27,000,000 lbs. for Great Britain and Ireland, but not .in the same proportion as the population has. The cause of this lies especially in the monopoly of the East India Company in China, on account of which the English had, up to a few years ago, to pay twice as high a price for tea as it fetched in Hamburg or Amster- dam, and since the duty (100 per cent.) was determined in proportion to the price, the tea had really to pay a quadruple price, without great advantage to the Company's interests. Since the monopoly was abolished in England, and the duty reduced, the consumption has increased, so that it may be estimated now at 36,000,000 lbs. for the British Empire, which makes about an average consumption of H lb. for each per- (* 12,000,000?. is annually paid for tea in Great Britain — four times the amount paid for coffee. (Crawfurd, 1852.) — Ed.) THE TEA-SHBTJB. 185 son (21bs. for Great Britain, lilb. for Ireland). In Holland the consumption amounts to §,000,000 lbs. ; in the north of Germany, to 1,500,000 lbs. ; in France, only to 230,000 lbs. ; in Russia, on the contrary, 5,500,000 lbs. The consumption of the whole of Europe may be put at about 60,000,000 lbs. North America consumes 10,000,000 lbs. The value of the tea which China exports by sea has been estimated at 11,000,000 piastres (about 2,000,000Z.). Opinions are, it is well known, divided with regard to the beneficial or injurious effects in a dietetic point of view. But \it may surely be assumed that tea is on the whole a whole- some beverage when not used in excess. Its reviving and Refreshing power is especially experienced after a hard pedes- trian journey, or any other effort ; it opposes corpulence and sleepiness, it does not intoxicate, but acts against the intoxi- cation produced by strong drinks. Tea was celebrated in verse by the Chinese emperor, Kien- Long. His poem was written on a hunting-excursion ; it was greatly admired, published in a splendid edition, and intro- duced upon porcelain cups which were used for imperial gifts. Among other things we find in it : " Set over a moderate fire a three-footed vessel, whose form and colour indicate that it has been long in use ; fill it with clear water of melted snow ; let this be warmed to the de- gree at which fish grows white and the crab red ; pour this water into a cup upon delicate leaves of a choice kind of tea ; let it stand awhile, till the first vapours which form a dense cloud have diminished, and only a slight cloud hovers over the surface. Drink then slowly this delicious beverage, and thou wilt become strong against the five cares, which com- monly disturb our spirits. The sweet calm which is ob- tained from a drink thus prepared, may be tasted, felt, but not described." The Europeans seem to have been agreed that wine is the only beverage that deserves to be celebrated in song. That the Chinese consider their national drink worthy of it, is not wonderful. Is there not some one-sidedness in the fact that we only sing of the beverage which awakens pas- sion, and not that which calms it ? But truly war is more frequently celebrated than peace. 186 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. CHAPTEE XXII. THE COTTON-PLANT. Or all the materials which mankind use for clothing, none plays so important a part as cotton ; this, therefore, certainly deserves especial attention, as also the plant which furnishes the substance. This plant belongs to the Mallow tribe. The stems of some species are herbaceous, even annual, as the cotton-herb, and other species are more or less woody, as the cotton-shrub and the cotton-tree, the last of which attains a height of 15 — 20 feet. The leaves are broad and lobed, usually five-lobed. The calyx is double ; the corolla five-leaved, usually yellow, but sometimes red. A great number of stamens exist, blended together by their filaments. The fruit is a capsule, which opens with several valves, and contains numerous seeds ; these seeds are covered with a long, close, white, or some- times yellow* pubescence, which is closely compressed in the capsule. This woolly pubescence is the cotton. As in other cultivated plants, there are many species and varieties of cotton, and it is very difficult to determine which are species and which are to be considered merely as varie- ties. The cotton-plant requires a warm climate ; it thrives within the tropics, and in the warmer parts of the temperate zone, to 30° — 40°. The most northern cultivation of cotton in Italy is near Naples, at 41° N. L., particularly about Castella- mare. More to the south, it is found in Puglia, Calabria, and Sicily. When the trade of the Continent was closed under Napoleon, the Italian cotton-culture was more con- siderable than at present. In Spain, cotton is cultivated on the south coast and also on the east coast of Valencia up to 40° — 41° ; it extends even to the plateaux. The cotton- culture in Greece and in the Greek islands is not incon- siderable, and it reaches to Constantinople, that is, to about the same latitude here as in Italy and Spain. It occurs exceptionally in the Crimea at 45°, but only on the south * For instance, in the cotton from which Nankin is made. THE COTTON-PLANT. 187 side of the high mountains, which afford shelter from the northward, and therefore cause a local warm climate in a limited district. The Asiatic coast of the Mediterranean, Asia Minor, Syria, as also the Asiatic islands, produce cotton, likewise Egypt, especially of late years, since Ma- homet Ali made great attempts to extend the cultivation of this plant. Cotton is also grown along the rest of the North African coast. Although Asia is colder than Europe in equal latitudes, the cultivation of cotton extends as far towards the north here, both in the west and in the east of this quarter of the globe ; for it is met with in Chiva and Bokhara, up to 40° — 41°, probably on account of the com- paratively dry and warm summer ; and likewise in China and Japan up to the same limit. In the interior, however, it is missed, on account of the extensive highlands. Both the Indian peninsulas, as well as Persia, produce cotton ; it flourishes also in the South African group of islands, and in the English colonies on the east side of Australia. That portion of Africa which lies within the tropics has cotton-culture, not only on the coasts, especially in Senegal, Guinea, and Congo, but also in the interior, as at Tinibuc- too, Bornu, &c. In North America cotton-growing is now diffused in an extraordinary manner, both eastward of the Alleghany mountains in Carolina, Georgia, and Florida, and westward of this chain in the basin of the Mississippi. The northern limit occurs here also about 40°. Cotton-culture is diffused also in the West Indies and Mexico ; also in tropical South America, especially in Brazil. The south limit is 30° on the east side of South America ; 30° — 33° on the west side. In the torrid zone of South America the growth of cotton extends up to a height of 4200 feet above the sea. The growth of cotton succeeds best on a soil not too rich ; it prefers to all others a dry, sandy soil. In several places it has been found that sea air has a beneficial effect upon the cotton-plant. The best kind of cotton, " sea-island cotton," as it is called, which is very long in the staple, comes from the low sandy islands lying between Charleston and Sa- vannah, in North America, and the cotton becomes gradually inferior as it is grown further from the coast. It is thought that the particles of salt which the atmosphere contains act 188 THE EARTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. advantageously upon the plants, whence saline mud is re- garded as a very excellent manure. Bain has an injurious and sometimes destructive effect at the season when the cap- sules begin to open, for the cotton then becomes exposed to putrefaction or mildew. The sowing and harvest seasons vary in different climates ; in the south of Europe cotton is sown in April and May and gathered in September or October ; in some districts there are two crops in the year. The seeds are laid in rows at a certain distance ; when the plants have attained a particular height, they are snapped off with the fingers to make them produce several shoots, and consequently more numerous flowers and capsules. The cotton-bush and the cotton-tree are also cut, with the same intention. Careful weeding is requisite to ensure a good crop. A cotton-field presents an extremely beautiful aspect in autumn, from the broad dark-green leaves, the large yellow flowers, and the snowy cotton which projects from the half-open capsules, for the plant bears ripe fruit while it is still in flower. Hence the gathering of the capsules has to be continued for a long time. This is effected by picking off, by hand, the capsules which have begun to open. They are then dried, and next the cotton is separated from the seed by means of an appa- ratus formed of two rollers, for as the seeds contain oil, they would otherwise destroy the cotton. When the cotton is packed for transport, it is compressed by very powerful presses, contrived for the purpose. We are able to trace the history of the diffusion of the cotton-plant and cotton with a tolerable degree of probability. Before the birth of Christ, the cultivation of the plant and the use of cotton for clothing was probably confined to India. Herodotus, who lived in the fifth century before Christ, re- ports that the Indians had a plant which bore, instead of fruit, a wool like that of sheep, but finer and better, of which they made clothes; and -\rrian narrates that the Indians made their clothes of a fine white kind of flax, which grew on trees. Other nations do not seem to have cultivated the plant at that time, or even to have used cotton ; at all events, only exceptionally, as a rare and expensive stuff. Thus it is assumed that the precious material called lyssus, spoken of among the Jews, was cotton. The growth of cotton and its use seem to have become diffused shortly after the birth of THE COTTON-PLANT. 189 Christ. Strabo (in the first century of our era) speaks of cotton being cultivated and manufactured in Susiana, on the Persian Gulf ; and Pliny mentions that the plant was culti- vated, not only in India, but in Upper Egypt, and says that the Egyptian priests used the material there grown for clothing. In all probability, the Arabs brought the cultiva- tion of cotton into Europe. In the time of Mahomet, the use of cotton was general among them, and the first country of Europe in which mention is made of the cotton-plant as an object of cultivation is Spain. The Arabian author, Ebn Alvam, mentions it as generally grown in the last-named country. Cotton-culture did not come till afterwards into Sicily, the south of Italy and Greece ; but cotton goods were brought from India, by Constantinople to Europe, in the middle ages. It is unknown when the growth of cotton was introduced into China ; various reasons lead us to suppose that it does not go back further than to the ninth century, and that silk was previously the general material of clothing ; while at pre- sent the rich use silk, and the poor cotton. Although, as already noticed, there existed at a very early period a tirade in cotton goods from India to Europe, which took place partly by way of Constantinople and partly by way of Egypt, which trade became gradually extended, still the use of cotton stuffs was very limited throughout the middle ages — in fact, for long after ; and although there were cotton-manufactories in Granada in the thirteenth century, in Venice in the fourteenth century, in Elanders in the six- teenth, and lastly in England in the seventeenth century (at least, of stuffs in which the woof was of cotton), these manufactures were inconsiderable in Europe till after the middle of the last century. Eew cotton goods were in use, and most of these were imported from India and China. It was in itself improbable that it could be made to pay to esta- blish cotton-manufactories in Europe, for the Indians and Chinese had brought these branches of manufacture to a con- siderable degree of perfection, the transport of the raw mate- rial from such distant regions necessarily increased the price of the manufactured article, while the cost of labour is ex- tremely low in India, on account of the few necessities of the natives, and the small price of them. Tet the reverse has 190 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. come to pass. The cotton-manufacture has risen to an extra- ordinary pitch in Europe, and above all in England ; in fact, to such a point has it come, that in spite of the low price of labour in India and China (which amounts to only one-tenth of the cost of labour in England), and in spite of the distant transport, no inconsiderable quantities of cotton-stuffs are exported from Europe to India and China. In the year 1832 cotton-manufactures to the value of 1,500,000Z. sterling were exported from England to those countries. This unusual phenomenon is owing to machinery. Eor while the work is done in India and China, now as for- merly, simply by hand, or by the aid of very rude, simple, and poor instruments, the manufacture is carried on in Eng- land by the most complicated machinery, spinning-machines and looms, which are driven by steam-engines ; and there can hardly be an event in the history of industry that demon- strates so clearly the triumph of machinery and of the human power of invention, as the history of the development of cotton-manufactures. "With a spinning-machine one man can spin as much in one day as an Indian can with his distaff in a whole year ; and goods are bleached in two days which formerly required six or eight months. The cotton-manufacture has advanced with giant' s strides in England, one of the last countries of Europe into which this branch of industry was introduced. In the middle of last century only 3,000,000 lbs. of cotton were imported into England ; so late as the year 1775, only 5,000,000 lbs. ; in 1820, 152,000,000 lbs. ; and in 1833, 300,000,000 lbs. Of these 300,000,000 lbs., about 17,000,000 lbs. were exported raw ; the remaining 283,000,000 lbs. were manufactured. The value of the cotton goods exported in the year 1764 amounted at most to 500,0002. sterling ; in 1833, notwith- standing the much lower price, to 18,500,0002. sterling ; the value of the entire manufacture was 34,000,0002. sterling. . In 1760 the manufacture of cotton employed 40,000 persons ; at present 1,500,000 (almost forty times as many), although machines do the greater part of the work. To do all by hand that is now manufactured, would require every fifth person in the whole of Europe to work in cotton. Liverpool is the greatest staple place in England for the import of cotton and the export of cotton goods ; for eight- THE COTTON-PLANT. 191 ninths of the cotton that enters England goes through that town. Manchester is the most important manufacturing place. In 1700, Liverpool had 5000 inhabitants ; in 1770, 34,000 ; in 1821, 120,000 ; and in 1831, 165,000. Manches- ter had, in 1774, 41,000 ; in 1831, 187,000. Originally, only the coarser kinds of cotton-stuffs were manufactured in England ; but subsequently, the manu- facturers applied themselves to the finer, even to the finest muslins. That muslin of the highest degree of fineness, such as is made by hand in India, is not furnished by machinery, is because the consumption is too slight to make the manu- facture of such goods pay, and not because it cannot be done. The making of the very finest Indian muslins is confined to certain districts and certain families, and it is decreasing. A report of two Arabian travellers of the ninth century states, that they had seen muslin so fine that a whole garment could be drawn through a finger-ring. A recent traveller, Ward, speaks of muslin so fine, that when it is spread out on a meadow, and wetted by the dew, it is quite invisible. Hence the Oriental poets call fine muslin " woven wind." The great consumption of cotton in England increased the demand for this article, and this demand called forth a greatly increasing cultivation of cotton, first in North America, and subsequently in South America. In the year 1784, some bales of cotton were confiscated in Liverpool, because cotton was said to be an article not produced by the North American States; in 1835, 386,500,000 lbs. were exported from thence. The home consumption is estimated at above 70,000,000 lbs., so that it may be assumed that the total production reaches 450,000,000 lbs. In the year 1821, 125,000,000 lbs. were ex- ported, so the production rose to more than double in those fourteen years. South America, especially Brazil, has sub- sequently come forward as a competitor, and some kinds of the cotton it furnishes are excellent. The worst cotton comes from its original home, India ; but it is thought that the cause of this lies in the neglectful and bad treatment used by the Indians, who have no taste for improvement. Dr. Wallich reports that he has cultivated cotton in the Botanic Garden at Calcutta, which can stand beside the best North American for quality. The greatly increased production, and the less expensive 192 THE EARTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. manufacture by the aid of machinery, have lowered the price both of raw cotton and of the manufactured cotton goods ; this reduction of the price has increased the consumption, and thus again the production and manufacture. Comparing the prices of 1833 with those of 1818, we find them sunk to little more than half. Cotton goods, which were formerly used for the most part only by the higher classes, the rich and independent, have gradually extended to the middle class, to the lower ranks, and even to the labouring classes. Every one must have observed the change in clothing which has occurred in this respect. It will not be without interest to compare the clothing of us Northerns in different periods. The oldest inhabitants clothed themselves in the skins of wild animals. Subse- quently, as the feeding of cattle gradually increased, the skins of domestic animals (sheep and calf skins) were used in com- bination with those of wild animals for clothes. At a more recent period the wool of the sheep was shorn, and coarse woollen stuff and cloths prepared, which constituted the most important part of the dress ; flax-cloth was a luxury at that time, and wool took the place of linen, even for the coverings next the body. The use of linen, together with that of wool, became more and more general, as by degrees the increasing commerce introduced more linen, and the cultivation of flax was increased in the country. Finally, cotton-manufactures have, to a considerable extent, taken the place of linen goods, and the substitution seems to increase constantly. In this manner, not only has the more-manufactured material taken the place of the less-manufactured or raw material, but the pro- ducts of the more remote countries have displaced the home products of the land and those of the neighbouring countries. The history of clothing leads the thoughts to the history of the development of the human mind. Not alone iu their dress were the skin, wool, linen, or cotton clothed inhabi- tants different ; simultaneously with those changes, and not uninfluenced by them, occurred manifold changes in their whole mode of life, in their mental occupations, and in their entire spiritual development. TLAX. 193 CHAPTER XXIII. FLAX. Eveey one knows the flax-plant ; the little shining seeds (linseed) are sown in April or May, and from them soon spring up slender, delicate stems, which branch at the upper part ; these stems are closely covered with lance-shaped leaves, and hear quickly-falling, sky-blue flowers at the top, after the fall of which the seed-vessels soon present them- selves, indicating that the plant, within three or four months after it was sown, may be pulled up to yield its fibres, which furnish us with an important article of clothing. I will not enter any further upon the description of the plant, but by a little deviation from the main subject, I will direct attention to some of the laws of nature which prevail in the vegetable kingdom, and appear very distinctly here. Daily experience must have made it sufficiently apparent, that all the more perfect animals are formed according to a type, wherein the organs are placed in pairs on each side of a middle line. This is abundantly shown by the four legs of the mammalia, and most reptiles, the wings and legs of birds, the pectoral and ventral fins of fishes, the six feet of insects, the eight of spiders, the great mmiber of pairs of feet in the Crustaceans and Annelides, the eyes and ears of animals, the two sides of the jaw, &c. The type of plants is totally different. "When conditions regulated by law present them- selves distinctly, which is chiefly the case in flowers and fruits, the organs generally radiate, as it were, from a central point. But there are some plants in which the parts are arranged on each side of a middle line (the symmetrical flowers of some authors), as, for example, in the Labiate flowers. On the other hand, the lower animals (Radiata, Polypes) exhibit the condition which prevails in most plants. Connected with this difference is the fact that even numbers prevail in the animal (except in the lowest classes), while odd numbers are most common in plants. The two numbers, 3 and 5, with their multiples, 6-9 and 10-20, are those which especially occur in the vegetable kingdom, in such a manner that in one large group of plants, the number three, in o 194 THE EARTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. another the number five predominates. We may hence call these the Ternary and Quinary plants. The flax exhibits the latter number very distinctly. Another natural law which we learn from the examination of plants is, that the flower is a collection of several circles of more or less transformed leaves, and that the leaves of these circles frequently alternate with each other. In the flax there are fire sepals, which do not differ much from the proper leaves of the stem ; next follow five large and more delicate sky-blue petals, each of which is placed between two of the sepals ; inside the petals occur five stamens, the blue colour and the structure of which betray their relationship to the petals, while they alternate with the latter ; then come five minute tooth-shaped bodies, which must be regarded as an inner circle of stamens which are undeveloped and barren ; finally, inside these are five carpels or fruit-leaves, which are blended together, but which exhibit the number five in their prolonged free points. These carpels subsequently form a fruit which is divided into five chambers, but each of these is again divided by a partition which projects from the mid rib (in the common flax reaching only half way) to the centre, thus forming ten cavities in the capsule. The most important use of flax, is that of the fibres, the long tough fibres which traverse the cellular tissue of the stem. These fibres are of the same structure as the last or liber of trees (the bast of the lime-tree, for example, of which matting is made), as the fibres of hemp, of the New Zealand flax, and of many other plants, which furnish ma- terial for clothing. Under the microscope these fibres appear as very long tubular cells, with very thick walls, composed of several membranes deposited on the inside of the primary membrane. In the preparation of flax, the bast-cells are separated from the looser proper cellular tissue. The use of the seeds is of less, but still considerable importance, the oil they contain (linseed oil) being used in many branches of manufacture, and for medicinal purposes. Flax is part of the inheritance of temperate climates. It is grown in Europe, the north of Africa, the temperate parts of Asia (wherever the warmth of the climate is not lowered by mountains), and on the east side of North America ; in the southern hemisphere as yet but sparingly ; in the torrid zone FLAX. 195 but little, and partly for the oil alone, as on the plateau of the Dekkan. The northern limits of its cultivation in Europe are at 65° in Norway, at 64° in Sweden and Russia. Flax is grown up to an elevation of 5500 feet above the sea, in the Alps. But there exist within this area of distribution certain tracts in which the cultivation of flax is very considerable, while in others it is repressed. The countries south-east of the Baltic (Russia and Prussia) are the most important flax districts, from thence there is an exceedingly large exporta- tion by Riga, Reval, Liebau, Pernau, and St. Petersburgh ; a large portion of Northern Europe, especially England, derives flax in a raw or manufactured state from this storehouse. Belgium, Holland, and a part of Prance, form another flax district. Egypt is a third, chiefly supplying the countries of the Mediterranean with this important product. It will, perhaps, be thought strange that flax should thrive both in hot Egypt and in the cold regions of Russia as far as 64°; but this circumstance is explicable when we remember that flax is a plant which rapidly completes the cycle of its life, and that in the north it is an object of culture in summer, in Egypt in winter. In the latter country flax is sown in De- cember or January, in the fields just quitted by the waters of the Nile, and is harvested in April or May ; in the north, it is sown in April or May, and harvested in August or Sep- tember. The conditions of temperature are thus not very different in these two places during the period of growth of the flax. In the torrid zone, partly even in the sub-tropical coun- tries, flax is replaced chiefly by cotton as a clothing-plant ; in certain districts, also, by other plants ; for example, in tro- pical America, by species of pine-apple and agave, the leaves of which contain fibres ; in China, Japan, and in the South Sea Islands, by the last of the paper mulberry ; in New Zealand, by the New Zealand flax, as it is called (JPhormwm !max) ; in Australia, by the bast of Melaleuca Imariifolia. In the temperate zone, hemp as well as flax is a clothing plant. Records of cultivation and use of flax lose themselves in hoary antiquity. In the second book of Moses, it is said that hail destroyed the flax and barley, when Moses was striving in vain to move Pharaoh to allow the departure of o 2 196 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. the Israelites. The Egyptian mummies are wrapped in. linen, and thus furnish a decided evidence of the use of flax in the most remote past. It is related that the priests of Isis were clothed in linen, because wool, growing on the body of an animal, is not so pure a substance as flax, which is a product of the earth, and therefore worthier of the holy ones. The use of flax among the Romans for linen and for the sails of ships is beyond doubt ; its cultivation in Italy cannot be denied, since it is mentioned by Pliny and the writers on rural economy. In older times woollen clothes were more usual than linen, especially for those next the body, among the Romans, but the use of the latter was quite general in the time of the emperors. " Why is not the product of flax used in daily life ?" says Pliny, in the first century after the birth of Christ. It is remarkable that flax and linen were also general north of the Alps ; Pliny speaks of the use of linen among the Gauls and Germans, and says that the Batavi, the enemies of the Romans beyond the Rhine, were ac- quainted with it, and that their women knew no finer clothes than those made of linen. (Just as in Holland at the pre- sent day.) Skins and wool certainly constituted the only materials of dress in Scandinavia in older times ; but so early as the ninth and tenth centuries, the use of linen was greatly diffused, for not only the " Jarls," but even the free peasantry, used linen, and the serfs alone didnot. In the old poem "Rigsmaal," Ase Big comes into the house of the Jarl, where he finds husband and wife sitting ; they are looking at each other and plying their fingers ; the husband is twisting strings for a bow, the wife is looking at her arms and smoothing the linen ; she afterwards takes an embroidered tablecloth of flaxen thread, white wheaten bread, swine's flesh, roasted birds, sour milk, and wine ; and at the son's wedding, a fine linen is thrown over the bride and bridegroom at the ceremony ; the new- born son is wrapped in silk. In the peasant's house the wife sits and spins, the husband cuts pegs for a loom ; and the new-born son is wrapped in linen ; when he is married, the sheets form part of the dowry. On the other hand, linen is not spoken of in relation to the third class, the serfs. Tet it is doubtful whether flax was cultivated in the north in former times. It is indeed related, by Svend, of the son FLAX. 197 of Canute the Great, who ruled for a short time in Norway, that in the eleventh century he levied a tax, consisting of unspunflax ; but on the other hand, there is evidence of a considerable importation of flax and linen into Norway, coming from England, and into Denmark and Sweden from the Hanse Towns, probably Flemish linen. It therefore appears, that the cultivation of flax was, at any rate, small in the north, in early times. Elax is first mentioned among the natural products, in Arent Berntsen's " Fruitful Glory of Denmark and Sweden," 1651. With the growing civili- sation the use of linen constantly increased in the north, although the cultivation of flax did not keep pace with its use. Notwithstanding that the whole of Denmark lies to the south of the limit of flax-growing, it is far from pro- viding for its own requirements in this important article. In the present century, as we have seen above, another clothing material from the vegetable kingdom, cotton, has attained a wonderful diffusion, and contributed to limit the use of flax. "We have seen, moreover, how the remarkable phenomenon of the manufactures of a material which is fetched from countries so distant as India, Brazil, and North Ame- rica, being furnished at a cheaper rate than those of a sub- stance which is produced in Europe, is owing to machinery, which greatly economising labour, renders the manufactured article so infinitely cheaper. The stiffness of the fibres of flax prevents its being treated so easily with machinery as cotton or wool, the short soft fibres of which are very readily combined ; it is therefore only lately, and after many attempts, that flax has been spun by machinery. This important dis- covery has already caused a fall in the price of linen, and flax will perhaps, consequently, again diminish the consump- tion of cotton. In the passage in his Natural History where Pliny speaks of flax, he remarks on the wonder that so great a power should be developed from so small a seed, that there should be a plant which can bring Egypt so near to Italy (inasmuch as navigation and commerce principally depend upon the product of this plant) ; but at the same time some rather absurd ideas entered into his head, for he grows angry that men should venture to brave nature by setting several sails on their vessels ; he curses those who invented navigation, as 198 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. well as those who brought it to pass that men should perish not only on the earth, but on the sea, without finding burial ; he discovers in the rapid washing of flax, and in the zeal with which it is cultivated, a proof that man hastens his own misfortunes ; nay, more, he regards the circumstances that flax exhausts the soil, and that it must be pulled up in order to be used, as proofs that the cultivation of this plant is a strife against nature. If Pliny had lived in our days, he would have found the wonder still greater ; for he would then have known not only that this little seed gives birth to a product which clothes nations and carries ships across the ocean, but that this pro- duct, after it is worn out, plays a still more important part ; that it not only conveys thoughts from man to man, but from individuals to thousands and millions ; that it diffuses know- ledge and enlightenment among the many different nations of the earth, and carries the Gospel to our antipodes. Whether he might have then looked with dismay at the error and mischief which paper has spread abroad in the world, I cannot venture to decide ; but I doubt it, for I think that paper would have put an end to such narrow views in him, as in the naturalists of the present day. THE PEPPEB-PLANT. 199 CHAPTEE XXIV. THE PEPPEB PLANT. The pepper-plant {Piper nigrum) is a climbing shrub, with opake, leathery, dark-brown, smooth leaves. The very small flowers are seated on a thick, fleshy, pendant spike or club-like body. After the flowers have faded, come the red- dish brown berries, each of which contains one seed. This climbing shrub is increased by cuttings, and trained either on sticks and posts or on trees, between which it hangs down in festoons, like the vines among the elm-trees in many districts of Italy. The looser branches of the trees on which the pepper-plant is trained are usually lopped, and the upper ones pruned into the shape of a fan, in order that the pepper-shrub may spread out conveniently upon them. In Malabar the mango-tree is often employed for this pur- pose, but its fruits, otherwise so excellent, are rendered per- fectly uneatable by the evaporation from the pepper ; in the Indian Archipelago the Dadap-trce (Erythrina corallodendron and indiea) are principally used for this purpose. The nature of the soil has not any very important influence, because the pepper-plant absorbs the moisture of the atmosphere very actively ; but a moist, and at the same time glowing hot cli- mate (80° — 84° Fahr.), is requisite. It is usually gathered twice a year. The first crop is yielded in the third year ; the best and richest from the fifth to the eighth year ; in twenty years it becomes perfectly useless. The berries are pulled ofl" before they are quite ripe ; they are dried on mats in the sun, which renders them black and wrinkled ; they are then packed in bags as black pepper. White pepper is not a peculiar species, but is obtained by steeping the berries in water or lime-water for eight or ten days, which loosens the outer shell, so that it can be easily peeled ofi". Of this kind, which has a milder flavour, comparatively little is brought to Europe — for instance, only one-fortieth of the entire con- sumption in Denmark ; but it is much esteemed in China. The area of the cultivation of the pepper-shrub is very limited. It is not grown further north than Groa, 15° N. L., and on the northern part of the Siamese Gulf, at about 12°; 200 THE 1AETII, PLANTS, AND MAN. nor further south than 5° S. L. ; nor further westward than the Malabar coast ; nor more eastward than Siam and the east coast of Borneo, thus between 75° and 120° eastward of Greenwich, with the exception, however, of a few plantations in Cochin China. It therefore occurs only in the most southern parts of the two Indian peninsulas, in the peninsula of Malacca and the islands near it (for instance, Pulo Penang), and in the Sunda Islands, as also in Ceylon. According to Crawford, the production is as follows : Sumatra 28,000,000 lbs. The other Islands of Polynesia . . . 0,300,000 „ Siam, Cambogia, and Malacca 11,700,000 „ Malabar 4,000,000 „ 50,000,000 lbs. The Malabar pepper is the best. The exportation from Malabar and Sumatra goes chiefly to Europe and North America ; from Siam, only to China ; from the other points, pepper is sent both to the east and to the west. The natives of Sumatra, and the other parts of Polynesia where pepper is so widely diffused, use it only as a medicine. The consumption in Europe is estimated at 16,000,000 lbs., that is, about one-third of the whole production. If the population of Europe is estimated at 230,000,000, it would give rather more than 1 oz. annually to each person, if all used pepper, and in equal quantity. The present consump- tion in the British Islands amounts to about 2,000,000 lbs., one-eighth of that of Europe, and more than 1^ oz. for each person. In the year 1615, onby 500,000 lbs. were imported into England. In the kingdom of Denmark, the average annual importa- tion for twelve years (1832-1 8 13) was 37,490 lbs., which gives about half an ounce for each person. The price has fallen greatly in recent times, partly on account of increased production, partly on account of the opening of the East Indian trade. In England it amounted, without the tax, to about : Od. per lb. 1814 . . . . Is. Od 1822 1830 . 3- 1 1832 4 THE PEPPER-PLANT. 201 According to Buchanan, the pepper-shrub is found wild on the Malabar coast, and in no other place ; this statement, the circumstance that the cultivated pepper is finest here, and that it has no aboriginal name elsewhere,* indicates that pepper has migrated from hence toward the east. It is re- markable that it only extends, in the Indian Archipelago, as far as the Hindoo civilisation is shown, by other memorials, to have extended. This diffusion of the pepper-culture, in spite of the comparatively narrow limits of its area, is still so considerable that, as above mentioned, the production in the original home constitutes only about one-twelfth of the whole. Pepper was known to the ancients as an Indian produc- tion. Pliny says, that in antiquity so high a price was set upon it that it was weighed out with gold or silver, which, however, must not be taken literally, but only that it was sold by weight at a very high price. The contribution which Alaric laid upon the city of Itome, in the fifth century, in- cluded 3000 lbs. of pepper. It appears that the pepper which was obtained in Europe in ancient times came solely from Malabar and Ceylon ; but in the middle ages, the Venetian traveller, Marco Polo, already speaks of pepper from the islands lying further cast. The Arabs brought pepper to Aden and Socotra, from whence it came chiefly by Alexandria to the countries of the Mediterranean. The Genoese and the Venetians gained extraordinarily by this, as they took an enormous profit on the article. Subsequently, after the Portuguese had discovered the road round Africa, the profit diminished; but when they had acquired dominion in the Indies, the price again rose, so that in this respect Europe gained nothing by the new road. Still greater was the profit of the Dutch at a period when they had a monopoly, and, besides, intentionally limited the production. They were gradually robbed of this vast profit, chiefly by competition of the English. The Spanish pepper, as it is called {Capsicum annum), as also the Cayenne pepper {Capsicum baccatum), belong to another group of plants, the family of the potato. They are American plants, which are used in that continent on account * It has one, however, in Sium also. 202 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. of their burning taste, instead of the pepper of the Old World. The betel, however (Piper betel), belongs to the pepper genus, and like the black pepper, is a climbing-plant ; but its use is quite different. The leaves, namely, of this plant are chewed, in combination with the Areca-nut (the fruit of a kind of palm) and lime, in the same way as tobacco, a custom which is extraordinarily diffused in tropical Asia. The area of its cultivation is hence much wider than that of pepper, but as it is not used in other parts of the world, the betel does not play such an important part in general com- merce as pepper. THE CLOYE-TEEE AND THE NTJTMEG-TEEE. 203 CHAPTER XXV. THE CLOVE-TEEE AND THE NtTTMEG-TEEE. The clove-tree {GaryopJiyllus aromaticus) , belonging to the myrtle family, is a handsome tree, as tall as our cherry. The trunk is slender, has a smooth bark, and the branches form a beautiful crown. The leaves resemble those of the bay-laurel, and remain upon the tree during the greater part of the year. The flowers, which are developed in the rainy season, are borne in corymbs ; the calyx is blended with the germen, fleshy, bright red, and its limb four-parted. The four leaves of the corolla are blended at their borders, and thus form a kind of cap. The fruit is a longish brown-violet berry. What we call cloves are the blossoms — namely, the calyx and closed corolla ; they are remarkable for their strong aromatic, and at the same time pungent flavour, which remains long upon the tongue. Besides the direct use as spice, the waste from the gathering (in particular the flower-stalks) is used for the preparation of oil of cloves. The harvest of cloves is gathered from October to December. The ground beneath the trees is cleaned, and the bunches of flowers picked by hand and by means of crooked sticks. The cloves are then laid upon woven mats and exposed to the smoke of a slow fire, which renders them brown ; they are afterwards dried in the sun, and there acquire the dark-brown colour they possess when exported. Five or six pounds are reckoned as the average yield of one tree ; but the crop varies very much in different years. A clove-tree ordinarily attains the age of seventy-five years, but there are examples of trees living 100 or 150 years. Pew plants have naturally so limited an area of distribu- tion as the clove-tree. Originally it was found only in the five very small Molucca Islands, especially on the island of Machian. Shortly before the advent of the Europeans it was conveyed to Amboyna, but it does not thrive so well there, and requires greater care. The Javanese, who were in pos- session of the clove trade before the advent of the Europeans, have tried in vain to transplant the tree to Java. The Europeans have carried it to the island of Mauritius and to 204 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. Cayenne, but the cloves produced there are but poor, and the cultivation probably only pays on account of the Dutch keep- ing the cloves which come from Amboyna at an incredible price, by an artificial system of trade. It is remarkable that the original inhabitants of the Moluccas do not use cloves, and have only learnt their importance from the demand of foreigners. The nutmeg-tree (Ifyristica moscliata) is a handsome tree, forty or fifty feet high, with spreading branches and ever- green leaves. The flowers are borne in small bunches, and bear some resemblance to the lily of the valley. The fruit is like a peach ; it is green at first, but as it ripens, acquires a reddish colour. It then bursts in the furrow which runs round it, and the carmine red covering of the seed (the arillus, an expansion of the stalk of the seed) emerges ; this mace, as it is called, forms a network round the seed or nutmeg. The tree bears flowers and fruit during the whole year, but the fruit is only gathered at three periods, namely, in April, July, and November. The first gathering yields the best, the second the most abundant product. The tree bears in the ninth year, and attains an age of seventy-five years. The pulp, which is indeed juicy, but at the same time astringent and disagreeable, is thrown away ; the mace is then separated from the nut, and dried in the sun, which causes its bright red colour to pass into pale red, and finally into light yellow, such as it appears in commerce. The nut is dried for three days in the sun, and then exposed to the smoke of a slow fire for three entire months, then freed from its shell, next dipped two or three times in lime and salt water, and finally dried once more, which requires two months. All this is done to preserve the nut from insects. Some, however, assert that it is done with intention of destroy- ing the power of germination, so as to prevent the diffusion of the nutmeg-tree. Crawfurd assumes that the whole of this expensive and tedious mode of treatment is superfluous, and that the nuts should be exported in their shells, which would best protect them. The increased cost of transport of the heavier goods would, he believes, be repaid by the saving of that tiresome labour and the careful packing. A good tree yields annually 10 lbs. to 14 lbs. of nutmegs and mace together. THE CLOVE-TBEE AND THE NTTTMEG-TEEE. 205 Although the natural diffusion of this tree is confined to a limited area, this is not so narrow as that of the clove-tree. Originally this tree grew wild in most of the eastern islands of the Indian Archipelago, and even on the north coast of New Holland and Cochin China ; but the limits within which the tree would yield good fruit were at first more confined, namely, New Guinea, Ceram, Gilolo, Ternate, Amboyna, Booro, and the surrounding islands. While the English had possession of the Spice Islands during the last war, they transplanted the tree to Pulo Pe- nang and the West Indies, but it did not thrive at all in the latter, and in the former place the tree afforded such a mediocre product that it fetched but a low price. It has also been transplanted to the Mascarenhas Islands, and its cultivation has been attempted in Brazil. The use of the nutmeg was just as foreign as that of cloves to the aborigines of the native islands. In Europe, neither cloves nor nutmegs were known in an- tiquity. The first traces of the knowledge of cloves are met with during the decadence of the Greek empire. The Arabs first brought cloves to Europe, and in the Arabian writers we find the first traces of the nutmeg ; they obtained these spices from Java, whither the Javanese, who had a considerable com- merce at that time, brought them from the Spice Islands. After the route round Africa had been discovered, the Por- tuguese, English, Dutch, Javanese, and Chinese, at first com- peted in the spice-trade, which was then perfectly free. But about the commencement of the seventeenth century, the Dutch monopolised the production and the trade. They ex- tirpated the clove-tree in the five Molucca Islands, in which it was originally indigenous, and restricted its cultivation to the little island of Amboyna, in order so to make themselves sole possessors of this product, and to place themselves in a posi- tion to determine the price according to their own inclination. They likewise, as far as they could, destroyed the nutmeg- tree in all the islands where it was found, and restricted its culture to the three small Banda Islands. In order to carry out this system of destruction effectually, the Dutch not only destroyed the trees themselves, but distributed gifts among the native princes, under an engagement from them that they should extirpate these in their territories. This naturally 206 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. gave rise to great dissatisfaction among the natives, and often led to the shedding of blood and to wars. The Dutch sent a fleet annually to examine whether the princes had fulfilled their promises. In the island selected for the cultivation of the clove-tree (Amboyna) the natives were allowed to grow it, but the trees were counted once a year, and the product was required to be given over yearly to the government at a fixed price. The nutmeg-groves were let chiefly to invalids and specu- lators, and their descendants are the present prosecutors of the branch of food-growing, with the aid of two thousand slaves. The natives have been, for the most part, driven out. The product of the nutmeg-trees is also required to be given up to the government at a fixed price. Contraband sale of nutmegs is punished, among the slaves and lower classes, with death, among the higher ranks with banishment. This system of monopoly is still upheld, although appa- rently it has been somewhat moderated very recently. It has produced evil effects on every hand : 1. To the inhabitants of the islands where these produc- tions were destroyed, since they were robbed of the opportu- nity of profiting by the gifts furnished them by nature. 2. To consumers generally, since the price was unnaturally exalted. The present price of nutmegs in Europe is (with- out duty) twelve times the natural price at the place of pur- chase, which is shown by the comparison with the price of pepper, the cultivation and trade of which has remained free, and which stood at the same price as nutmegs while the commerce was unrestricted. In like manner, the price of cloves is twenty-one times the natural price at the place of purchase. The price is now the same as it was two centuries ago, while the price of unmonopolised spices has fallen greatly. Pepper was formerly almost as dear as cloves. It is partly in consequence of this that the production and con- sumption of these spices has diminished. At the commence- ment of the seventeenth century, when the trade was free, 3,500,000 lbs. of cloves were produced in the Moluccas ; on the introduction of the monopoly, the production sank at once to 800,000 lbs., and now amounts to only 700,000 lbs. At present, 750,000 lbs. of nutmegs (nut and mace) are pro- duced on the Banda Islands. Crawfurd estimated the con- THE CLOVE-TBEE lUTO THE NUTMEG-TREE. 207 sumption of nutmegs in Europe, about 200 years ago (before the monopoly), at 550,000 lbs. ; in the middle of last century, at 250,000 lbs. ; and in the year 1810, at 110,000 lbs. After the English had conquered the islands, and transplanted the nutmeg-tree to Pulo Penang and other places, the consump- tion rose to 450,000 lbs., which is less, therefore, than it was two centuries ago, notwithstanding that the population of Europe has so increased both in numbers and in wealth. 3. To the producers — for as they must deliver the product at a fixed price, while in regard to the cloves the number of trees is fixed, there exists no stimulus to industry. Of the price which the clove-producers obtain, in the first place one- ninth is deducted for the military and civil officials, and from the remainder one-fifth is again taken, half of which goes to the rajah, and half to the elders of the race who superintend the cultivation. 4. And lastly, to the government. For since the product is so small, and the supervision expensive, the net receipts, in spite of the enormously high prices, are small, and, doubt- less, much smaller than they would be under a moderate tax or a moderate duty, with free production and open trade. The government is constantly troubled by the producers requiring a rise in the legally fixed price, which demand it has frequently been obliged to grant.* The monopoly, and the compact to take the entire product, lead to the forma- tion of great accumulations in store, which often spoil. When the English conquered the Banda Islands, in 1810, they found in the magazine 37,000 lbs. of nutmegs fallen into dust. Thus the history of these spices affords a striking example of the destructive operation of the system of monopoly; certainly the system has been driven to its extreme limits in this instance, and stands exposed in its vilest form ; but we find more or less of the same unwholesome effects in monopoly generally. » The price allowed by the government to the producers is five times that which prevailed during the free trade. 208 THE EAKTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. CHAPTEE XXVI. THE TOBACCO PLANT. The plants belonging to the tobacco genus are, with few exceptions, annual herbs, with undivided, broad, and some- what fleshy leaves ; the flowers have a five-toothed calyx, five-parted corolla, and five stamens ; the fruit is divided into two chambers. The tobaccoes belong to that natural family which Linnaeus called the " suspicious," and to which the henbane, thorn-apple, belladonna, and several of the most powerful narcotic poisonous plants, belong, as also, however, the potato. In a fresh condition the plant has little smell or taste, but when dried, the leaves acquire a stupefying smell, and a very sharp, bitter flavour. Tobacco, like the potato, is indigenous in America. Considering that this plant affords no edible fruit, root, or other nutritious part, that it is distinguished neither by beauty nor sweet odour,but, on the contrary, has a disagreeable smell and taste, produces, when eaten, nausea, vomiting, and giddiness, and in larger quantities is even deadly,* — dwelling only upon these properties of the plant, it was a result very little to be expected that it should come to play any part besides that of a medicinal agent, still less that it should be- come an important object of cultivation, of manufacture, and of trade, employing many thousand human beings, and consumed by millions. But experience has proved the reverse, and shown here, as sometimes happens with persons, that those of whom one least expects it, rise to high honour and dignity. The Spaniards found this plant in America when they arrived there. It was stated by the earliest travellers that the natives used it medicinally, especially as an important application to wounds. It is likewise related, that it was customary for the higher personages of the Mexican court to smoke cigars. When the English founded colonies in North America, they met with the same custom among the natives, especially in Vir- ginia. Europeans seem to have first made acquaintance with * Nicotine, as it is called, an alkaloid substance contained in tobacco, is so strong a poison that four or five drops will kill a dog. THE TOBACCO-PLANT. 209 tobacco in the Antilles, for the name " tobako " is Haytian, (in Haytian, properly not the plant, but the pipe through which it is smoked), while in Mexico it is called yete, and in Peru sagri. It is erroneous to suppose that it derived its name from the island of Tobago. An Italian, named Benzoni, who travelled in the West Indies in the years 1542-1546, thus half a century after the discovery of America, treats at length of the consumption of tobacco. Not long after, namely in 1559, tobacco was trans- planted, as a medicinal herb, to Lisbon ; and the French am- bassador to Portugal, Nicot, in honour of whom the plant received its botanical name, Nicotiana, sent seeds of it to Queen Catherine de Medecis, whence the plant acquired in Prance the name of the " queen's herb;" while in Italy it was called Herbe de St. Croix, and Herbe de Temabou, because the Papal Nuncio in Lisbon, St. Croix, and Ternabou, the ambassador to France, conveyed it into Italy. In 1586, the English colonists who returned from the settlement founded in Virginia by Sir Walter Raleigh, brought tobacco with them to England ; and Paleigh's companion, Harriot, relates that the English learned tobacco-smoking from the Indians. Through Paleigh and other men of fashion, this custom spread rapidly in England, and soon after likewise in Holland, Spain, Prance, and Portugal. The fashion is said to have passed, into Holland by means of the young Englishmen who went over to Holland to study. The custom seems also to have spread with great rapidity to Turkey, Persia, India, Java, and even to China and Japan. Already in 1601, there- fore scarcely fifty years after the introduction of the plant into Portugal, tobacco-smoking was known in Java and in China, and it is believed that the custom is still older in Japan. Some conclude from this that tobacco was known in Asia, especially Eastern Asia, before the discovery of America. They state that the species cultivated in China is different from the American species, and also that the species grown in Persia, which furnishes the renowned Shiraz tobacco, is an indigenous Asiatic species. But the essential ground for assuming that tobacco has been introduced into Asia, lies in the fact that it has not a special name there, and that through- out India,in Java, China, Japan, and the Lochoo Islands, it has kept the name of tobacco, except in Arabia, where it is named 210 THE EAETH, PLAHl'S, AND MAN. by a word signifying smoke. But it is possible that the Chinese, after having learnt the use of tobacco from the Portugese, may have applied a native, nearly-allied plant* to the purpose, and that the same may have occurred in Persia in reference to the Shiraz tobacco. The use of tobacco, like all novel customs, necessarily ex- perienced attacks and persecutions ; but it also had its active defenders and diffusers. In the former respect, the diatribe of the English king, James I., against the smoking of tobacco, which appeared in 1619, under the name of Misocapnos, is a remarkable work. He advances how unworthy it is for a civilised nation to adopt habits from such barbarians as the wild Americans ; that the use of tobacco is injurious to health, weakens the body, dulls the understanding ; that it brings uncleanliness with it, and acts mischievously upon the tone of social life ; that if tobacco-smoking should increase in the way it has commenced, women would at last be compelled to have recourse to it, otherwise they could not bear to live with their stinking husbands ; and he concludes his treatise with the following strong expressions : " Have you not, then, reason to forbeare this filthy noveltie, so basely grounded, so foolishly received, and so grosslie mistaken in the right use thereof ? In your abuse thereof, sinning against God, harm- ing yourselves both in persons and in goods, and raking thereby the markes and notes of vanitie upon you ; by the custome thereof, making yourselves to be wondered at by all forreine eivill nations, and by all strangers that come among you to be scorned and contemned : a custome loathsome to the eye. hatefull to the nose, harmfull to the braine, dangerous to the lungs, and in the black stinking fume thereof nearest resembling the horrible Stygian smoke of the pit that is bottomless." It must be observed, however, that although James was really an enemy to tobacco, which is shown by his forbidding its cultivation in England, this essay was rather the fruit of royal caprice than of full earnestness ; hence it was superscribed " A Royal Joke against the Abuse of To- bacco," (Lusus regius de abusn, Tabaci). But it was, never- theless, refuted in perfect seriousness by some Jesuits in Poland, in a treatise called Antimisocapnos. It is evident ■ The Chinese species is said to stand so close to Nicotiana Tabactm, that it may be a variety produced by cultivation. THE TOBACCO-PLANT. 211 King James preached to deaf ears. Tobacco- smoking in- creased in England to an extraordinary degree, and did not begin to diminish again until the last half of the last cen- tury, when it did so to some extent, on account of persons of the higher ranks no longer considering it quite elegant to smoke tobacco ; but the use of snuff increased. On the other hand, a certain Raphael Thorins, in 1628, ■wrote a hymn in honour of tobacco, while Pope Urban the Eighth excommunicated those who took snuff in the churches. One thing which greatly contributed to diffuse the use of tobacco was the ease with which this plant could be cul- tivated in most climates, so that it was not long before the growth of it was commenced in various parts of Europe, Asia, and Africa. In some countries, however, its culture was either wholly forbidden, or subjected to numerous re- strictions. Erom the constantly increasing consumption, the governments found this article of luxury very well adapted for becoming a source of income to the state. It thus hap- pened that all tobacco-trade became a royal prerogative, the governments selling the tobacco at a very high price. The consequence of this was, that either the cultivation of tobacco must be forbidden, or only allowed under condition of handing over all the product at a fixed low price. This arrangement existed until very lately in Cuba, and still pre- vails in Mexico, two countries particularly well fitted for the cultivation of tobacco. The tobacco is only allowed to be grown at particular places, and it must be delivered up to the officers of the government ; a few officials are distributed about the country, in order to pull up all tobacco-plants found elsewhere, and they have to see to the delivery of the tobacco in the districts where the cultivation is permitted. It is na- tural that such a system should give rise to much infraction of the law and extortion. In many countries where the tobacco-trade is not a royal monopoly, an extremely high duty is laid upon the article. In Great Britain the growth of tobacco is forbidden. In other countries the home production of tobacco has been en- couraged, as in Pomerania, Silesia, and also, formerly, in Denmark, where a little is still grown near Eredericia. The cultivation of tobacco has become diffused over the p2 212 THE EARTH, PLAHTS, AND MAN. greatest part of the torrid and temperate zones. The nortli limit in Scandinavia is at 62°— 63° N. L* Most regions of America produce excellent tobacco, espe- cially Virginia, Carolina, Venezuela, and Cuba, and these are also the places which furnish the greatest quantity. Of 33,000,000 lbs. imported into England in 1831, 32,000,000 lbs. came from the North American States. Cuba exported, in the year 1840, 200,000 boxes of cigars, or 200,000,000 cigars. If we estimate the average price of a box containing 1000 cigars at 15 piastres (21. 12s. 6d.), the foregoing gives a value of 3,000,000 piastres (525,000Z.)f Brazil also exports a great quantity of tobacco ; according to Martius, 3,000,000 lbs. were exported from Bio Janeiro alone in 1817. In Europe, the most important cultivation is carried on in Holland, Elanders, Alsace, in the Palatinate, Hungary, in the Ukraine, and Turkey ; but the tobacco grown in these places is inferior to the American. In the Levant, on the contrary, the tobacco is excellent. India and the Indian Archipelago produce much tobacco. In Java the young plants are raised on the mountains, at an elevation of 2000-3000 feet, and sold by the mountaineers to the inha- bitants of the plains, who plant the young seedlings in the fertile low grounds. Still more is grown in China and Japan. Tobacco has also been introduced into the Cape and Australia. According to the average of the years 1832-1843, duty is levied upon 2,400,850 lbs. annually, for home use in the king- dom of Denmark; of this, 2,279,034 lbs. are tobacco-leaves, so that about nineteen-twentieths are manufactured within the country itself. If we calculate how much of the various principal kinds of tobacco comes from a certain quantity of leaves, and add to this the imported manufactured tobacco, we obtain something like the following figures, which, however, are somewhat doubtful, because I am not in a condition to reckon accu- rately the proportion between tobacco for smoking and that for chewing. It must be observed here that the leaves which are used for tobacco, especially for chewing-tobacco, from the additions they receive in the manufacture, yield more, and in * The author has seen tobacco in the bishopric of Bergen, t According to Liebmau's account. THE TOBACCO-PLANT. 213 reference to the latter kind almost twice the quantity, and that the waste of raw tohacco-leaves is slight. In this way we get a greater quantity of tobacco consumed than is intro- duced in the form of leaves. Smoking-tobacco (including cigars) and chewing-tobacco 2,336,175 lbs. Snuff 576,040 lbs. If we then take as the annual average — 12 lbs. for a smoker and chewer, 6 lbs. for a snuff-taker, we obtain 194,681 smokers and chewers, 96,006 snuff-takers 290,687 consumers of tobacco. Assuming, then, that one-fourth of the snuff-takers are women (24,000), there remain about 267,000 men who use tobacco. Xow, as there are 400,000 of the male sex above fifteen years in Denmark, it follows that out of forty grown- up men, twenty-six to twenty-seven, that is, considerably more than half, are consumers of tobacco. 214 THE EARTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. CHAPTER XXVII. THE MISTLETOE. In Nature we are accustomed to see the organised bodies which, from their reciprocal resemblance, are accounted members of the same natural groups, retaining their agree- ment both as to form and vital functions in all essential points, and also that the differences within individual groups, as well as those between different groups, do not occur with- out mediating transitions. Hence we are surprised when we sometimes come upon isolated forms or physiological arrangements, and we strive, by more minute investigation and the enlargement of the sphere of observation, to reduce the deviations under general laws. We are amazed when we find a group of animals among the Mammals which fly in the air (the bats) ; among birds, a genus which lays its eggs in the nests of other birds, and leaves the care of providing for its young to them (the cuckoo) ; or when, among the fishes, we find one which climbs up trees (the climbing perch of the East Indies). I shall now call attention to a similar anomaly in the vegetable kingdom. It is exhibited in the plant known as the mistletoe, or bird-liine (Yiscum album). Let us imagine that on a winter's day we see upon the branches of an apple-tree a bunch of intercrossing yellowish- green twigs, bearing leaves of the same colour. The unusual character of this feight arrests our attention. Perhaps we at first suppose it to be a climber, like the ivy, which, although fixed in the ground by its root, has wound itself up the trunk, and become attached to this and the branches by means of its sucker-roots ; but this idea must soon be aban- doned, for we see nothing of it on the lower part of the trunk, only at the top. We then cut off the apple-branch, to examine the yellowish-green plant more closely. "We see- that it is wood, just as the apple-tree is ; that annual rings occur in its wood, as in other trees ; and when we trace its numerous crossing shoots to their origin, we find that the main stem springs from the branch of the apple-tree ; we discover, moreover, that the union is not confined to the THE MISTLETOE. 215 barks, but that the wood of this plant is connected with that of the apple, somewhat as a graft is connected with the wild stock upon which it has been grafted. But the matter only becomes more strange from this, for it is very readily per- ceived that the apple-tree cannot have become so changed as to be able to send out yellowish-green forked shoots, and to bear leaves, thick leathery leaves too, in winter. As little can the apple-tree bear little leathery flowers with a four- parted envelope, or a berry filled with tenacious glue, instead of an apple. And we are equally unable to suppose it to be a graft, for not only do we know that only nearly-allied plants can be grafted on one another, while the mistletoe is extremely different from the apple, but we seek in vain for the mistletoe upon the ground. It is met with only upon trees which all differ in the highest degree from it. Consequently, there is nothing left for us but to suppose that the mistletoe is pro- pagated by seed upon the tree itself, and obtains its nourish- ment from this, and need not, like other woody plants, grow upon the ground, and draw its principal food from it. We have, then, before us a true parasitical plant, and it is a para- sitical shrub of quite as complex structure as other completely developed plants. "We readily find the seed in the glue which fills the berries, and if we open a seed, we are struck by finding, not, as in the generality of seeds, one germ of a new plant, but either two or three* (in the latter case the seed is triangular, in the former, oval), and that during germination the radicle, which is close to the end, grows out from each germ. Another striking peculiarity is, that while the germs (or embryos) of most seeds are white, or at all events not green, they are green here. The rootlet which grows out in germination is also green, while roots in general never have this colour. It is well known that the radicle of plants generally has a definite tendency towards the earth, so that when a seed is reversed, that is, placed with the radicle turned upwards, this makes a curve and grows towards the ground. The seed of the mistle- toe has not a tendency towards the earth, but towards the interior of the branch upon which it rests ; therefore, if it is upon the upper side of the branch, it has a tendency down- (* One seed is most common, three .very rare in the ripe fruit. — Ed.) 216 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. wards, while if the enveloping glue fixes it to the under side, it grows upwards. One of Dutrochet's experiments showed that this tendency to the interior of the long branch, is an endeavour to seek the dark. When he placed mistletoe seeds, on the inside of a window, the radicle grew in towards the darker room ; while if he placed them on the outside, it strove, no matter in what position the seed was placed, to growtowards, and not away from tho glass. The attempt to make the plant grow in earth or water is vain. It succeeds only on another tree. When the seed germinates upon a tree, a kind of thickening is produced in the hark of the latter, at the spot where the radicle is in contact — much as when the bark of a tree is attacked by certain insects ; the root-fibres then shoot throiigh the swollen and injured bark down into the wood, and spread out partly in the bark, and partly between the bark and the wood. They gradually grow thicker and be- come woody, like the roots of any other woody plant ; the tree upon which the plant grows, deposits the new annual layers of wood around the roots of the mistletoe (like those of a stock around its graft), and thus originates the close connexion which we see between the full-grown mistletoe and the tree upon which it grows. The branches of the mistletoe grow in all directions, and divide into widely spreading little shoots ; thus giving rise to that close interlacement of branch- lets which clothes the apple-tree. There can be no doubt the mistletoe derives its nourishment from the tree upon which it grows. The stiff, leathery leaves could not, bike the leaves and stems of succulent plants, ab- sorb moisture from the air, and experiments have shown that colouring matters pass from the wood of the tree into that of the mistletoe ; and if the mistletoe is abundant, the tree upon which it grows suffers. Instead, therefore, of drawing its nourishment from the earth or air like other plants, the mistle- toe derives it from another vegetable. Yet it cannot be as- sumed that it absorbs the descending, elaborated sap, but only the_ crude ascending sap. We are led to conclude this when we see that the mistletoe has leaves, and, in fact, green leaves, and is provided even with the organs which especially serve to elaborate the sap in plants, and moreover, when we observe that mistletoe flourishes equally well upon different trees, which could not be supposed if it took up elaborated THE MISTLETOE. 217 sa^s, which would then be of different kinds. Tet, although it is thus the crude sap which is absorbed by the mistletoe, this must not be supposed to resemble the crude nutrient fluid which plants in general take up from the soil, for it is well known that at a certain height in the trunk, the latter has already undergone a chemical change, and the fact that the mistletoe will not grow in earth or water, also indicates this, although this may, indeed, arise partly from the absence in the roots of the organs through which the nutrition else- where takes place. The mistletoe is found on many different trees — on apples, pears, and other orchard-trees, on the mountain-ash, the elm, the willow, the lime, the ash, the poplar, the beech, the oak (but not frequently), nay, even on Coniferous trees. In the north it occurs but seldom, and only within very restricted local conditions ; in Zealand it is found only near Petersvaerk and Yemmeltofte ; in old times it was found near Fredericia ; in Holstein, near Neumiinster; in Norway, on some islands in the Christiania fiord ; in the south of Sweden it is much more frequent, but likewise very much scattered within its area of distribution — for instance, near Christianstad in Schoonen, Kinnekulle in "West G-othland, in the island of Malar, &c, in Bleking, Smaaland, and Halland. In Central and Southern Europe it is more frequent. Its diffusion ex- tends to the most southern parts of Europe, for I have seen it upon Mount Etna. In the greater part of Europe, the mistletoe is the only parasitical shrub, the only one of the more perfect plants which draws its nourishment out of the trunk and branches of another tree. But if we extend our inquiries to other parts of the globe, we see this fact, isolated in the north, connected with others, and the peculiarity thus loses some of its importance. Even in Austria and Hungary, we find a nearly-allied parasitical shrub, Loranthus europaus, which, indeed, is not rare in the south of Europe. Out of Europe, especially in the tropical countries, several hundred species of both these genera are met with, which are all parasites upon trees. But we find an extension of this phenomenon in another direction also. "We have, in Europe, certain parasitical plants which grow upon the roots of other vegetables (trees 218 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AH1) MAN. or herbs), such as Monotropa hypopitys, the species of Oro- itmehe and Lathrasa squamaria. In these, the rootlets of the parasite penetrate the roots of the plants, as those of the mistletoe do into the stem, or else they are interwoven with the extreme, delicate fibrils of the root upon which they occur ; and it seems as if, in the last case, the nutrition was carried on by the root-fibrils of the parasite absorbing the moisture from interposed roots of the foster-plant. These root-parasites are distinguished from the mistletoe by the fact that they are of a pale yellow, or, at least, by no means of a green colour, and that they are destitute of perfectly-developed leaves, which appear only in the form of white, yellow, or brown scales. The Dodders (Cuseuta) form an interesting transition from the ordinary plants growing in the ground, to parasites. Their seeds germinate in the earth ; the extremely weak, thread-like growing stem winds up another plant, and shoots little papilliform processes into it ; the lower part of the stem gradually decaying, the nutri- tion is then carried on solely by these papillae ; in this condi- tion, the plant can wind from one plant over to another, and send new absorbing organs into the latter. It thus becomes a very mischievous weed, as, for example, upon flax. Transitions toward the parasites have been found even among the twining-plants, that is, plants which wind round other plants or lifeless objects, without drawing nourish- ment from them. There have been instances of Convolvulus arvensis sending papillss into the substance of the plant on which it grew, while ordinarily it only twines around it, and is rooted in the soil. It is not a matter of surprise that a plant of such peculiar aspect, and which occurs in such a remarkable position, as the mistletoe, should have awakened the attention of various races, and exerted influence over their religious ideas. It played an especially important part among the Gauls. The oak was sacred with them ; their priests abode in oak-forests. Oak-boughs and oak-leaves were used in every religious ceremony, and their sacrifices were made beneath an oak- tree ; but the mistletoe, when it grew upon the oak, was pe- culiary sacred, and regarded as a divine gift. It was gathered, with great ceremony, on the sixth day after the first new moon of the year ; two white oxen, which were then for the THE MISTLETOE. 219 first time placed in yoke, were brought beneath the tree ; the sacrificing priest (the Druid), clothed in white garments, ascended it, and: cut off the mistletoe with a golden sickle ; it was caught in a white cloth held beneath, and then dis- tributed among the bystanders. The oxen were sacrificed with prayers for the happy effects of the mistletoe. A beverage was prepared from this, and used as a remedy for all poisons and diseases, and which was supposed to favour fertility. A remnant of this seems to exist still in France; for the pea- sant-boys use the expression, " au gui l'an neuf," as a New Tear's greeting. It is also a custom in "Wales* to hang the mistletoe to the roof on Chrismas-eve ; the men lead the women under it, and wish a merry Christmas and a happy new year. Perhaps the mistletoe was taken as a symbol of the new year, on account of its leaves giving the bare tree the appearance of having regained its foliage. The mistletoe also occurs in the Northern mythology, particularly in the Balder Myths.f Balder was the wisest, the most eloquent, and the most pious among the Asen (demi-gods) ; he diffused light around him, and nothing unclean was suffered to be near him. But it was prophesied that he should die, and unquiet dreams made it known to himself. Then did Freya, his mother, ob- tain oaths from all existing things that they would not injure him — from fire and from water, from trees and all metals, from all animals, snakes, and from all diseases. It then became an amusement in the assemblage of Asen to cast weapons at him, and strike him ; for nothing hurt him, and the Asen rejoiced. But the wicked Loke was angered at it. Putting on the shape of a woman, he asked Freya whether (* Not in other parts of Great Britain ? Our author does not seem fully to understand this custom. — Ed.) t The expression inVoluspa, xxix, that the mistletoe was slender and fair, and rose from the ground, might lead to doubt whether this could mean our mistletoe ; hence some have given other explanations ; but the circumstance that the Ice- landic name, Misteltheinni Voluspa, corresponds to the name mistel, in the Northern languages, seems decisive for the ordinary interpretation of the word. It is not only called mistel ia Germany and Denmark, but also in Norway and Sweden ; we find the same name in the English missel and mistletoe, and the Anglo-Saxon misteltan; and as, in Icelandic, tein signifies a slender stick, the Anglo-Saxon tan means a branch ; and the Danish word teen, still used for the slender iron of a distaff, likewise signified a branch or twig, in the old language. In West Gothland, in Sweden, the mistletoe is called vispelten. 220 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. nothing in the world could hurt Balder. ~Ereya, then said that she had not obtained an oath from the mistletoe, because it seemed too young and thin to require an oath from.* But Loke went and cut a spear from it, and persuaded the blind Hodur that he also should confer on Balder the honour of throwing a weapon at him. Hodur took the spear, and when he cast it at Balder, the latter fell to the earth dead. All the Asen were speechless with sorrow ; the heart of Nanna, Balder's wife, broke, when she saw the corpse of Balder carried to the ship on which the funeral-pyre was to be lighted. But Preya sent Harmoder to the world below to buy Balder free. The answer was, that now was the time to find out whether Balder really was so amiable and so beloved as men said ; if all things, without exception, upon the earth, living or lifeless, mourned for him, he should return. The Asen sent messengers over the whole world, and all mankind, all animals, trees, and rocks, shed tears ; but as the messengers returned, they met a Jette woman, named Thock, who refused to shed tears, and said : " Let the Shades keep their prey." It is believed that this was Loke, who had assumed the woman's shape. * The mistletoe, although woody, is rather slender. If this insignificance had not been mentioned expressly as the cause of its being passed over, we might have been inclined to seek it in the fact of its not growing from the ground like other trees. CHARACTEBISTIO PLANTS OF NATIONS. 221 CHAPTER XXVIII. CHABACTEBISTIC PLANTS OF NATIONS. When investigating the geographical distribution and diffusion of plants, we ordinarily look at them in relation to the zones of the earth, to climates, quarters of the globe, or to the different elevations above the sea, in which they are met with. "We inquire, for instance, within what degrees of latitude the pahns grow, in what parts of the globe the vine flourishes, or at what height above the sea the Alpine herbs occur. But we will look at plants in relation to the various races and nations ; we will inquire what plants originally fell to the share of each, and played an important part in their lives. In the happy climate which the South Sea Islands present within the tropics, flourishes the oread-fruit tree, the most important food-plant of the natives of Oceania. This noble and. beautiful tree has a richly foliaged crown, and bears a great number of very mealy frviits, which, when cooked, taste like wheaten bread. These trees are sufficient to support a man for eight months of the year, during which long period they bear fruits which gradually ripen. During the remainder of the year, fruits are eaten which have been placed in pits, and undergone a kind of fermentation. Thus, as Cook some- where remarks, it is easy for a man to provide for himself and children, since it is only requisite to plant ten such trees to supply food for a family. But this tree has other uses ; the wood is used for canoes and furniture, and the bast for textile fabrics. Another tree which plays an important part in Oceania, especially in the lower Coral Islands, is the cocoa-nut palm, which, however, also grows abundantly in the Indian group of islands between Asia and Australia, and on the coasts of India. The trunk furnishes wood ; the fruit yields the almond- like kernel, the oil, and the milk ; the shell is used for house- hold utensils, the fibrous substance round it for woven fabrics ; the houses are thatched with the leaves, and the cocoa-nut tree also gives palm-wine and palm-cabbage. The New Zealand flax (Phormiwn tenax) is characteristic 222 THE EABTH, PLANTS, .4.ND MAN. of the islands whence it derives its name. The leaves of this plant are remarkable for long, tough fibres, which far exceed our hemp and flax in strength. The natives make their clothes and thin string and cordage of it. Among the Malays of the Indian Islands, the spices — the clove-tree, the nutmeg, the pepper, and the ginger — are the principal characteristic plants, but they have these for the most part in common with India generally. Maize (giving the most abundant but also the most un- certain crops of all kinds of corn) was originally solely pos- sessed by the American races. The cultivation of it was considerable in Peru, and this up to a considerable elevation above the sea ; it was even grown, though not without difficulty, around the Inca's Temple of the Sun, on an island of lake Titicaca, 12,000 feet above the ocean, to furnish a sacrifice to the Sun- God, and that the corn grown there might be distributed throughout the nation, who regarded a single maize-grain raised near the temple as a noble and fortune- bringing object.* Maize was cultivated in North America, also, before the advent of Europeans. America inherited another glorious gift in the potato; it flourished in the higher regions, and furnished abundance of food in its mealy tubers. Before the time of the Europeans, also, the maguey-plant (Agave potatorum, Zmccarini), the vine of the Mexicans, was cultivated on the elevated plateaux of Mexico. This plant does not flower in its native country until the eighth or tenth year, but when the great flowering stem is about to be de- veloped, an extraordinary quantity of sap flows towards the bud. The development is arrested by cutting out the heart- leaves, and then the sap is drawn off three times a day for several months ; this sap is caused to ferment, and affords a beverage (pulque) of a pleasant acidulous taste, but having a disagreeable, decayed odour. The maguey-fields which are ordinarily met with on the plateaux of Mexico (6000 or 7000 feet) do not usually yield until the fifteenth year. The pro- duction is so large that the tax on the consumption for the three states of Mexico, Puebla, and Toluca, amounts to 1,000,000 piastres (175,000?.) The fibres of the leaves of * Meyen, Geography of Plants. OHAEACTEEISTIC PLANTS OT NATIONS. 223 another species of this genus {Agave americana)* are used for making clothing-stuffs. It has been transplanted into the south of Europe, and is there known as the aloe. At a greater height in Mexico than where the maguey grows, as also above the limit of rye and barley in Peru and Chili, there is another characteristic plant, the quinoa (Cheno- podium quinoa). Its small but numerous and very mealy seeds furnish a food much used in these districts, partly boiled into a kind of porridge, partly roasted (the chocolade of the highlands). But the greater portion of the aboriginal races of America (especially in the lower districts) were, and are still, unac- quainted with cultivation of the soil, and stand at a very low degree of intellectual development ; very often they have no characteristic plants. But there is one example of a race whose existence is most intimately connected with a single wild plant. The country of the Guaraunas, on the lower part of the Orinoco, is overflowed during the rainy season, at which period of the year this race of savages live upon trees like monkeys, upon the Mauritia palm, which occupies this tract, growing socially. Prom the leaf-stalks of this palm they manufacture mats, which they suspend between the trunks ; here they live and make themselves at home, light fires, feed upon the abundant fruit of the palm, and prepare a palm-wine from its sap, and bread from its sago- like pith. Turning to Africa, we find in its northern parts, as also in the north of Arabia, the vast zone of deserts, so poor in vegetation, where the nomade Arabs have received a glorious inheritance in the date-palm. Its numerous and well-flavoured fruits give them food, and also to their camels and horses ; the trunks provide them with wood and fuel, the leaf-stalks and leaves serve for woven fabries. In the southern part of the Arabian peninsula, and in Abyssinia, the coffee-tree appears as the characteristic plant ; it yields the ordinary beverage of the races living here. The Hindoos received two important plants — rice and cotton ; the first forms the daily, and, as this race eats no meat, almost the exclusive food ; the second furnishes almost (* The American aloe, or hundred-year plant of our gardens. — Ed.) 224 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. the sole material of their clothing. Without these material gifts the Hindoo cannot exist ; a failure of the rice-crop causes universal famine. The characteristic plant of the Chinese is soon found ; it is the tea-shrub, which yields a beverage which for them is the same as wine in the vine-countries, and beer and spirits in the north of Europe. The original characteristic plants of the races which in- habit Western Asia and Europe, and which are called the Indo-Caucasian races, are ivheat, barley, rye, and oats (which are generally called the European Cerealia, but scarcely with right, since Western Asia seems far rather to have been the part of the globe from which they emanated). These, and, among them, wheat especially, form the chief objects of agriculture and the principal material of the food of these races. Southern Europe, and the part of Western Asia which borders on the Mediterranean, have an important cha- racteristic plant in the olive, which gives the South-Cau- casian races oil, which is not merely used for illumination, but takes the place of the butter which is so extensively used by the northern races of the same origin. The vine also forms part of the inheritance of this race ; it constitutes an important object of cultivation, and between 30° — 35° yields a beverage of great consequence. The Laplanders, who belong to the Polar race, have no characteristic plants, unless we reckon as such the reindeer- moss, the principal food of their domestic animal, from which it takes its name. In this sketch we have only noticed the original distribu- tion of plants among the races ; but great revolutions have occurred in this distribution, and the present conditions are very different from those which existed at first. A close investigation will show, however, that it is almost solely the Caucasian races which have effected these revolu- tions, and that these have taken place almost simultaneously with the increasing civilisation of the former. The Caucasian races, above all, the Europeans, have been able to transplant, by degrees, into their own homes the characteristic plants of other races. They have fetched the finer kinds of fruit — the almond, the apricot, and the peach — from Asia Minor and CHABACTEEISTIC PLANTS OP NATIONS. 225 Persia, the orange from China; they have transplanted rice and cotton to the coasts of the Mediterranean ; brought maize and the potato from America to Europe, where they now support millions of human beings, and have chiefly contributed to prevent famine in the failures of crops which have taken place. These races have, moreover, been able, by their extensive industry and their commerce, to acquire possession of the products of foreign characteristic plants which will not thrive at home. They have procured, partly even for daily necessities, the tea of the Chinese, the coffee of the Arabs, and the rice and cotton of the Hindoos. But the influence of the Caucasian races, and of the Euro- peans in particular, in changing the distribution of cha- racteristic plants, becomes far more extensively evident when we look to the colonies established in all climates, where in some cases the countries have passed wholly into the posses- sion of an European population. Eor they have not only carried their own characteristic plants to the colonies, or those also which they had previously transplanted into their own homes, but they have, after acqiiiring countries with different climatal conditions, transplanted into these such as would not flourish at home, and thus have found themselves in a position to collect the characteristic plants of almost every race around them. Thus have the European corn- plants acquired a widely-spreading cultivation throughout North America, in Mexico, and the elevated countries of South America, in Chili and Buenos Ayres, in South Africa, in the temperate parts of Australia and Van Diemen's Land ; thus the vine has become an object of cultivation in Madeira, the Canary Islands, South Africa, and the highlands of South America ; thus rice and cotton are now grown in extraordinary quantities in the warmer parts of North America and in Brazil ; thus have the coffee-tree and the sugar-cane been transplanted into the "West Indies and Brazil ; the nutmeg and. the clove into Mauritius and Bour- bon, and various West Indian islands ; and thus has the plantation of tea commenced in Brazil, in Java, and in India ; and the cultivation of the New Zealand flax in New Holland. The Europeans have even conveyed characteristic plants to other races, which knew how to value them. They have transferred several European and tropical plants into the Q 226 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. South Sea Islands, which, previously unknown, are now cultivated by the natives ; the remnants of the American population which are still found in the highlands of Peru, Chili, and Mexico, have acquired European plants ; in like manner the negroes of the west coast of Africa have received from the Europeans maize, tobacco, and other American plants. On the other hand, what other races have done to change the distribution of characteristic plants, is very little : the Arabs contributed to diffuse cotton, the sugar-cane, coffee, and the date-palm ; but the Arabs belong to the same primary race as the Caucasians. The Chinese appear to have procured cotton from Hindostan, and the Japanese the tea- shrub from China. The Europeans, and above all the North Europeans, conse- quently are those who, both in their own home and in their colonies, have been able to acquire the greatest quantity of the characteristic plants of other races ; while their own country, especially the north of Europe, is so very poor in characteristic plants ; for all the important cultivated plants of Northern Europe have been introduced {callage, turnips, carrots, and asparagus, which are perhaps indigenous, are among the less essential). We find in this a great proof of the intellectual superiority of these races, and we have here an example that the child of the poor man, gifted with great natural powers, industry, and activity, has far more power over prosperity than the rich heir. I know not whether there may be an)' among my readers who would be inclined to see in these revolutions a serious confusion of nature, or might fear that as the races gradu- ally appropriated each other's peculiar possessions, the globe would approach nearer and nearer to a tiresome uniformity. One sometimes hears expressions which indicate such a fear ; complaints are now and then made, that interesting descrip- tions of strongly contrasted races become rarer in accounts of voyages and travels. Not only have many differences vanished in Europe, so that, for instance, in a drawing-room in Moscow one can fancy himself in Paris ; but those attractive accounts of the natives of the South Sea Islands which the earlier cir- cumnavigators gave us, are exchanged for reports of how the inhabitants of these islands now go clothed in the European fashion, build ships, establish schools for mutual instruction, CHARACTERISTIC PLANTS OF NATIONS. 227 and build churches. High up in the Himalayas, 7000 feet above the sea, where a few years since a wild race dwelt, only visited by tired pedestrian Hindoo pilgrims, there are now, as Jacquement reports, the baths of Simla, with sixty European houses, where people in shoes and silk stockings ride in Euro- pean equipages to a dinner-party, served in the European fashion, where champagne and Rhenish wines are drunk. In Australia, where not long ago nature existed in virgin condition, and the savages stood at the lowest point, where a tew suspended branches served to protect from the weather human beings who lived on sea-mollusks, there exist at present European cities, with hotels, coffee-houses, billiard- rooms, reading-rooms, and horse-races. The incalculable advantages which mankind attains through the increased intercourse of nations, the progress of civilisa- tion, not only material, but intellectual, which keeps pace with this, must very soon remove the discontent at the in- creasing uniformity. But it may even be asserted that civi- lisation is far from favouring uniformity among nations, and that it rather calls out increased natural diversities. "We must not overlook, namely, that civilisation arouses many intellectual powers which have slumbered, and that many entirely new conditions arise ; and the awakened in- tellectual faculties are not all developed in the same manner ; the new conditions do not remain every where the same ; and, in this way there is formed, contemporaneously with the uniformity which is undeniably produced in certain direc- tions, abundance of new differences which far exceed the old ones. Who can question that there is much greater dis- tinction between the English and Erench than between the negroes of Guinea and those of Mozambique, or between the different savage races in the interior of Brazil ? 228 THE EABTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. CHAPTEE XXIX. THE ACTION 0! THE HUMAN RACE TTPON NATT/RE. Man is a part of nature; she acts upon him, and he is subject to her laws ; yet man stands, as it were, outside nature, and hence is capable of reacting upon her in a totally different way from all other creatures — of transforming her, and even to a certain extent to conquering and prescribing laws to her. Civilisation, the development of the intellect, is the means by which man has gradually freed himself from the rule of nature, and passed, as it were, from the position of a servant to that of a master. Looking at the savage in his lowest type, he whose dwell- ing is composed of a few interwoven boughs, whose food consists of marine shell-fish, or the raw fruits of the wood and field, whose clothing is of undressed skins, we see that nature does not suffer any appreciable change or transfor- mation at his hands ; on the contrary, his food, his clothing, his dwelling, his whole existence, are entirely dependent upon natural occurrences, lying out of the sphere of action of his will. As long as man is still a hunter or a fisher, his position remains, in a high degree, dependent upon nature ; his ac- tion upon her very slight, since at this stage of human deve- lopment population is necessarily very scanty. His influence is essentially confined to accidental deterioration of the forests, through careless use of fuel, or to the extirpation of particular species of animals in certain regions. The nomade affects nature more than the hunter or fisher. Particular animals are tamed, and multiply in comparatively greater abundance ; the aspect and habits of these animals are modified, wild animals are attacked, the pastures of one region become exhausted, and recourse is had to others ; meanwhile the heaths and forests are destroyed by fire, their ashes giving rise to a more luxuriant growth of grass. But it is when man becomes an agriculturist that his great influence upon nature comes into operation ; and, step by step, as agriculture, and, with it, intellectual development THE ACTION OF THE HUMAN EACE UPON NATURE. 229 progresses, the effect becomes evident in many directions, although, indeed, not always so violently as at first, when, for instance, the forest is rooted out, without mercy, to form arable land. We will glance over the most important changes which man produces in nature at that stage of his development. The soil, bearing for the most part perennial grasses and other perennial plants whose roots are interwoven in the ground and form a firm covering of turf, or filled with in- numerable stones, is cleared, and brought under the mastery of the plough and spade ; the soil is loosened, and sown, in tracts of varying extent, with plants which are usually har- vested in the course of a half, or, at most, a whole year ; many weeds, especially annual plants, thus have an opportu- nity of becoming diffused. But dry, unwooded regions often require no little labour to make them available ; it is, there- fore, often found more convenient to burn off the heaths, to cut down the forest, and to burn either it or the stumps of the trees which are left ; which has, at the same time, the advantage that the ashes manure the earth, and increase the crops. This is the " haidebrande" of Jutland, and the " braate- brand" of Norway, still occurring in those countries, though less extensively than in former times ;* it is applied, at the present day, and on a gigantic scale, in. North America, Brazil, Java, and many other tropical countries where colo- nists have settled ; it was formerly carried on in the Antilles, Canaries, Madeira, and the Cape de Verd Islands, where the forests were soon extirpated. The fires often spread ac- cidentally far wider than is intended. Subsequently, when the wooded land has been cleared by fire, and the treeless by the plough, that land is attacked which is naturally too wet for agriculture ; the moor and marsh are now laid dry ; the water is drained from damp meadows ; the beds of rivers or brooks are narrowed, or another direction is given to their course. Even the sea is not spared ; not only are the (* It is practised also in the Khine provinces. On the Moselle, tracts of wood may commonly he seen on fee, in autumn, on the hill-sides. The ground is cropped with com about once in fourteen years, and wood allowed to grow up in the interval. Portions of this are cut, and removed for use, but the greater part is burnt for the sake of the manure given by the ashes.— Ed.) 230 THE EAKTH, PLANTS, AND MAN. coasts protected by dykes, but bays of various sizes are dammed in, and the sea-bottom changed, first into pastures, and then into arable land. But it is not merely to a few of the plants belonging to the country that man grants the privilege of clothing the earth and displacing the rest ; so far as the climate does not oppose hindrance, he brings in many foreign plants from near and distant regions. Our corn-plants, for instance, have been brought to us from Asia, most of our fruit-trees and kitchen vegetables also ; the potato and tobacco from Ame- rica ; cotton was conveyed from India to North America and Brazil ; coffee from Abyssinia and Arabia to Java, the West Indies, and Brazil ; we have obtained a great number of use- ful and ornamental plants from North America, Asia, and the south of Europe. There exist also remarkable instances of the plants introduced by man becoming greatly diffused independently of his agency, so much so as in certain cases to displace the original plants ; the artichoke and the peach- tree afford examples of this in the pampas of South America, paralleled there in the animal kingdom by the wild horses and oxen, which have in like manner become very widely diffused over those plains. In St. Helena the original flora has been almost driven out by the foreign plants which have made their way to the island. That which is true of plants holds also of animals. Our common domestic animals have been conveyed to all parts of America, which was totally devoid of domestic animals before the advent of the Europeans* — to South Africa, Australia, Van Diemen's Land, New Zealand, the South Sea Islands, &c. — and great revolution both in nature and in human life have resulted from it. On the other hand, civilisation has caused the extirpation or expulsion of many kinds of animals, as the elk, the aurochs, and the beaver in Northern Europe, the furred animals in North America, the hippopotamus and crocodile in Egypt ; these and the rhinoceros and the giraffe at the Cape, the lion in Greece, the wolf and wild boar in Denmark and Britain. (* The llama is said to have been domesticated at that time by the Peruvians. — Ed.) THE ACTION OF THE HUMAN RACE UPON NATUKE. 231 But not only has man brought about great changes by transporting plants and animals from one country or from one part of the globe to another, man has also produced, or, to speak more strictly, compelled nature to bring forth a con- siderable quantity of new creatures, which did not previously exist, and are now daily increased in number. I here, of course, allude to the origin of modified forms (varieties and races). The infinite number of races of dogs, from the large mastiff to the little spaniel, from the light, long-legged grey- hound to the short-legged, thick-set terrier, would not have existed if man had not influenced the wolf and jackal ; and as little the many races of horses, from the light, delicately- formed and swift-footed Arabian to the clumsy, elephant- footed Norman horse, unless man had obtained influence over the wild horse. If nature had been left to herself, we should not have known the many kinds of apple (1400-1500), but only the wild crab, from which they have all been de- rived ; nor the numerous kinds of coleworts, the thousand varieties of roses ; and without the most recent cultivation, we should now have only, as we had fifty years ago, the simple dahlia, instead of 1500 double varieties. Man effects changes on the soil as well as in the plants and animals of a country. Working the land, clearing it from stones, burning off heath and wood, manures, draining away water or restricting it in proper channels, alternation of crops and pasturing, all this must essentially change the cha- racter of the soil. Yet the effect is not confined to this ; man exerts influence even over the climate, even though, as I believe, not so much as is usually supposed. The removal of forests influences the condition of humidity, at all events in the warmer coun- tries, and particularly in mountainous regions ; the earth and air beneath trees become cooled, and this cooling causes the condensation of the vapours in the atmosphere, which fall as dew or rain, and so springs are more readily produced. The felling of the forest gives the winds free play ; the drainage of marshes and lakes, as also the deepening of streams, di- minish evaporation, and thereby again somewhat lessen the moisture of the atmosphere. The temperature and the winds are modified together with the conditions of humidity. 232 THE EABTH, P1ANTS, AND MAN. The enumeration I have here given, consists of well-known facts, and it was not my intention to treat that rich theme in greater detail. My purpose was simply to furnish a concise and striking representation of the effect of man upon nature, in order, in the next place, to examine two questions which arise from the consideration of the foregoing, and will not perhaps prove destitute of interest. It is an often-expressed assertion, that culture, or civili- sation, destroys the original beauty of nature ; that, regard- ing only material advantages, it robs us of the enjoyment of free inartificial nature. Such statements come especially from the more aesthetic portion of the people ; poets, land- scape-painters, and the fair sex, are particularly inclined to make these complaints. The uniform corn or potato fields meet us tiresoinely everywhere, instead of picturesque places, adorned with the most varied herbs and flowers, and with alternations of forest and thicket ; the natural flowery mea- dows give place to clover-fields or other artificial, uniform meadows ; cattle may no longer wander about unobstruct- edly in the open country, they are kept in stalls, even in summer, or they are fastened up in pens in the fields. The roads must no longer curve and wind, and thus bring variety into the landscape ; we are carried forwards on mile-long lines, straight as a stretched cord, slowly on the high-roads, rapidly on the railways, where the landscape vanishes before the eye can seize it ; straight hedges, in the south high walls, divide the land into quadrangular sections, and limit the pros- pect ; the trees are not allowed to retain their picturesque disorder, they are planted or sown at fixed distances apart, and still less are they allowed to attain their natural age, their natural size or beauty. The stag and roe are either wholly expelled or confined in zoological gardens ; the song of birds is silenced ; the solitary trees in fields are cut down, because they stand in the farmer's way ; the moors disap- pear ; fixed boundaries and courses are prescribed to the brooks and running streams, so that they may not injure the fields, or to make them drive mills and manufactories. The fruit-trees are cut, nailed and trained upon walls, losing their natural beauty, &c, &c. A number of animals are converted into monstrosities, to increase the amount of flesh or fat. THE ACTION OF THE HITMAN EACE UPON NATUEE. 233 All this, and much more, I admit. But the matter must be examined on the other side also. I will not make any remarks concerning the many ways in which civilisation increases the pleasures of human life, espe- cially the intellectual pleasures, and thus richly repays the supposed loss in the beauties of nature ; for all must agree with this. There can scarcely be any one in these days who would exchange the advantages of civilisation for the enjoy- ment of the beauties of nature ; that period of sentimen- talism when men were of opinion, or at least represented themselves as of opinion, that the happiest life is led in savage nature, has already passed away. The painter also knows well that he is a son of civilisation, for savage nations have no painters. On the contrary, paradoxical as it may perhaps appear at first sight to many, I will venture to assert that civilisation, while it limits the enjoyment of the beauties of nature in some cases, does really on the whole increase these enjoyments in a far higher degree, nay, I may say, also in the most varied manner. In the first place it must be remarked here, that important as the influence of man upon nature is, it is not nearly so great as is often thought by those who do not look closely into things. Great as the transformation of the soil, and the plants and animals covering it, is, the atmo- sphere, the clouds, the sun, the moon, and stars remain to us unchanged ; for even when a large city or a manufactory rob us of these beauties of nature in their immediate vicinity, through coal-smoke, this extends over such a little space that we can soon get out of it, especially since coal itself assists us, and will rapidly remove us from the smoky cities. We have the sea too, for the largest of the dyked-in tracts of it are but very minute portions of the vast ocean. In like manner we retain the chains of mountains and hills, with all the variety which their lines afford under the play of sun- light. The great lakes and rivers also remain to us. "While the sea, the atmosphere, and the contours of the earth's sur- face remain to us, we have all the prominent features of the landscape, which cannot be essentially injured by changes in detail. We must not forget, moreover, that the natural objects 234 THE EAETH, PLANTS, AND MAN. arranged by man also possess their peculiar beauty, and we should be altogether ignorant of these without civilisation. The waving corn-field has its beauty, and so have the long alleys of Lombardy, with their vines twining from tree to tree ; the orchard, when in fall blossom in spring, or loaded with fruit in autumn, is beautiful ; an avenue of limes, an arcade of growing trees, a wall covered with blooming roses, a well-planted flower-bed, every one of these is beautiful. Besides, civilisation procures us the sight of an incredible number of plants which we should never otherwise see in our houses. Without civilisation we might certainly see beeches or oaks, perhaps finer than at present, but we should not see the fir, the pine, the larch, the acacia, and the plane; we should indeed have the hawthorn and hazel bushes, but not the flowering shrubs and bushes which now adorn our plea- sure-gardens. We should not see the blossoming peach or apricot trees, nor their fruit ; we should be destitute of the whole of the large foreign flora, which enlivens us and produces so many enjoyments, so much variety, in our gardens and rooms, not to mention our conservatories, which give at least an imperfect idea of tropical vegetation. Again, the infin ite variety which arises in races and varie- ties, would not exist without cultivation. "We could not feast our eyes on the endless series of roses ; we should have to be content with the simple wild rose; the stock, the dahlia, the aster, and the auricula, with their countless varieties, would be unknown to us. And no one will deny the beauty of these objects, or assert that they are not beauties of nature. Here I shall, at all events, have the flower-painter and the ladies on my side. Without cultivation we should not have the fine varieties of fruits, as of the apple, for the poor wild crab of the woods would be our only fruit of this kind. The same holds good of animals ; a handsome Arabian horse, pretty races of pigeons, are certainly beauties of nature. And how many ways and means to the enjoyment of the beauties of nature civilisation itself affords us — beauties which we should know nothing of without it ! With what facility we now reach the Alps and Italy ! Do not more than a hundred times as many persons now go to those places as did half a century ago, to enjoy beauties which their eyes had THE ACTION OF THE HUMAN BAOE TJPON NATUBE. 235 else never beheld? or, to confine ourselves to a narrower sphere, how many people, even of the poorer class, are able now, compared with former times, especially by the aid of railways, to visit the nearest mountains, the nearest sea-coast,