THE VEGETATION OF NORTH GREENLAND. 151 
blubber; they are kept easily underground or in a cold room. Blaa- 
berries (Vaccinium uliginosum) are much less plentiful, and ripen well 
only in an eastern aspect, and are dependent on the weather of the 
summer. These also keep well under the snow till the spring, and I 
have found plenty of them in May at the head of Jakobshavn’s icy 
fiord, just as they appeared after the melting of the snow; but they 
are soon gone after being thus uncovered. The Greenland Blaa-berries 
are smaller than those which grow in our (Danish) woods, but pleasanter 
and sweeter. They are not used by the Greenlanders, who have a sort 
of prejudice against them and consider them hurtful. There is still a 
third kind, the Tytte-berry (Vaccinium Vitis-idea), which grows only 
in the southernmost parts, chiefly around south-easterly bays, and only 
ripening in fine summers. Further north I have heard of plants, but 
not of their producing fruit. The berries are not eaten by the natives, 
and are only turned to use by being preserved with sugar*. 
Finally, there are not a few plants which offer their flowers, buds, 
leaves, or roots, to be eaten either raw or cooked ; as the Sedum Rhodiola, 
which only grows south of Egedesmind and on the island Tosak ; Pedicu- 
laris hirsuta, which is plentiful, and the flower of which is cooked like 
cabbage; Zpilobium (E. latifolium ?) the flowering heads of which are 
also eaten. This grows most freely round the sites of old houses, by 
the bird-cliffs, or on the sandstone which contains coal-seams; here 
the thick bushes attain a height of one or two feet. The Cochlearia 
also grows near old dwelling-places and on the outer islands, which 
are enriched by the birds; as far as we learn, neither of these plants 
are eaten by the natives. They do however make much use of the 
Quan (Angelica Archangelica), the stalks of which are eaten raw ; but 
this plant has only a limited extent, and except in the southern parts, 
it is only met with on the island of Disko, helping to confirm the story 
that goes of this island, that Disko was torn from a more southern 
land, and conjured by a sorcerer into its present position. Iceland 
Moss (Cetraria Islandica) is found everywhere, though in greatest abun- 
dance on the outer islands of the southern districts, probably from their 
abounding most in moisture and fog. The Greenland Moss is consi- 
* On the whole, it appears that North Greenland has a dry, rather than a damp 
climate. . The distribution of moisture is not unworthy of notice. Its outer coasts 
have more of the fogs and raw cold weather, and this explains why the berries always 
ripen better within the fiords and up Disko Bay, even close up to the inland ice, than 
on the outer western islands. gauca 
