FLORA OF TIBET OR HIGH ASIA. 217 
of this class of plants. This probably does not exhaust the 
number existing in Tibet; partly due to their similarity, and 
partly to close grazing which would prevent flowers being 
produced. We have the evidence of the travellers, repeated in 
their respective “ Itineraries,” that relatively luxuriant pasturage 
was found in certain valleys and sweet-water lake districts, and 
it is further clear that abundance of pasturage must exist some- 
where within the range of the enormous herds of roaming animals 
that so astonished some of the travellers. On the other 
hand, long stretches of country were traversed in which grasses 
occurred only in tufts, like the majority of the other plants. 
CUSHION-LIKE PLANTS. 
Foremost amongst these is Thylacospermum rupifragum, 
Schrenk, Caryophyllacew. This is like a coarse moss with the 
stems so crowded together as to form a consolidated mass. 
Arenaria musciformis, Wall., and Stellaria decumbens, Edgew., 
belonging to the same natural order, are similar in growth, but 
the cushions do not attain the great size and density of Thylaco- 
spermum. Androsace Tapete, Maxim., and other species of Primu- 
lace display the same peculiarities. 
Woopy Prants. 
The woody element in the vegetation of Tibet within our limits is 
exceedingly small, including nothing more than afoot above ground, 
and, with the exception of the Astragali and Artemisia, described 
in preceding paragraphs, such woody plants as exist are extremely 
rare and mostly near the confines of the country. Clematis 
orientalis, L.,is the tallest, so far as our specimens B0, being just 
about a foot to the top of the inflorescence. Rockhill collected 
itin longitude 94° 45’, where it was abundant at 14,000 ft., and 
Deasy and Pike collected it in 82° 41’, and note that it had been 
observed three days before. There is no evidence of its existence 
between the longitudes given. Nitrarva Schobert, which grows 
five or six feet high in favourable situations outside ot Tibet, 1s 
represented by a fragment collected by Hedin in S. Tsaidam. 
Myricaria prostrata, Hook. f. et Thoms., 18 widely spread, but it 
is quite prostrate and makes branches at the most six inches long. 
The variety of Potentilla fruticosa, L., attains similar dimensions, 
Of Caragana pygmea, DC., there is only a single specimen from 
Gugé. Lonicera hispida, Pall., collected only by the Littledales, 
in the Goring Valley, grows larger in the locality named, where 
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