VEGETATION OP HIGH MOUNTAINS. ] O, 



©f elevation, stopping as precisely at 2600 melres, and within 

 these limits, is so abundant and vigorous, that it would be as 

 difficult to extirpate it there, as it is to cultivate it elsewhere*. 



The juniper traverses far beyond this circle, up to the elevation Juniper, 

 of 29OO metres, but this shrub, as it ascends, gradually loses the 

 habit and nppearance, which distinguish it in our plains : there, it 

 resembles the juniper of Sweden and Lapland, with a low 

 spreading stem, prostrate on the ground, seeking an asylum, as it 

 were, by instinct on those sides of the rocks exposed to the south 

 or wesu, against which it spreads out its branches into an espalier, 

 with a regularity which art can seldom attaint- 



In a more elevated region, we find the rigour of the climate Annuals 



will not permit the existence of ajw shrub whatever, which the scarcel y found 

 - r J at a certain 



first snows do not entirely cover. Still higher, even this shelter height. 



is insufficient, and nothing but a few herbs, with perennial 

 roots actually under the earth, subsist. Nature has almost en- 

 tirely banished from such places annual plants ; where the whole 

 summer is reduced to a few days, nay, sometimes a few hours ; 

 where often a storm of wind, or dripping fog, will destroy the 

 flowers which have scarcely blossomed, and, bringing back 

 winter, terminate the year. 



On the contrary, hardly any elevation seems to stop the pro- Hardy peren- 

 gress of some perennials, which, on the approach of severe cold, ni a !s - 

 shelter themselves under the double protection of the earth and 

 snow, forming their buds underground, and springing up the first 

 fine day of the succeeding year. Their duration exhausts the 

 chances of all times and seasons, till, sooner or later, they also 

 ripen seed, by which they are multiplied. 



Thus the vegetable zone of our alps has in fact no other limits, pi ants at t h e 

 than those of the earth or soil covering them. The Picdu Midi, height of S278 

 which I hafe ascended 26 times, is 3000 metres above the level ^ &rd9 > 

 of the sea, but I never once found the thermometer there rise 

 to the temperate point. Yet, on a nearly bare rock, I have there 

 gathered as many as 48 species of vegetables, excluding crypto- 

 gamous plants: of these, one only, which perhaps I may never 



* No shrub is more plentiful, or easily cultivated in the gardens about 

 London, if planted in light sandy peat under a rock, or north-west wall, 

 and watered plentifully in dry weather. — Sec. 



T Two distinct species are probably here confounded, an opinion in 

 Ti(hich I was confirmed by the late Mr. Dryander. — Sec, 



C 2 find 



