120 Botanical Notices from Spain. 



spreads over all the mountains, in many places alternating with A. 

 camphorata, L., while A. Absinthium, is abundant chiefly in the alpine 

 region. In the bogs and springy places of the mountain region, 

 especially in the upper part of the valley of the Jenil, Helosciadium 

 nodijiorum, Koch, occurs frequently, and Anagallis tenella, L., in 

 company with a Lythrum and Senecio, Juncus glaucus, L., which also 

 fills all the bogs of the limestone formation, and is the commonest 

 species in the Sierra ; a few Carices are also met with ; while on very 

 dry, sunny places, with soil of a stony hardness, particularly in the 

 neighbourhood of the chalets, Mcrendera Colchicum, Ram., are still in 

 flower in countless numbers. The upper alpine and lower snow-region 

 is the richest in rare plants, peculiar to and most plentiful in these 

 mountains. These consist almost solely of micaceous slate, the stra- 

 tification of which has an inclination of about 20° from south to north. 

 Accordingly the north slope of the chief alpine chain is encompassed 

 by much steeper and sometimes formidable perpendicular cliffs and pre- 

 cipices than the south side, which is almost everywhere covered with 

 loose masses of slate rock. On this side, in the passes between the 

 highest peaks of the mountain- chain, pools or small mountain-lakes 

 are frequently met with, occasionally of unfathomable depth, as for 

 instance the famous Laguna de Vacares : these lakes are more rare on 

 the north side. The main valleys, which extend to the snow-region, 

 terminate in peculiar scattered meadows, watered by many springs and 

 brooks, and sometimes perpetually inundated, and in grassy, often 

 very steep declivities. These peculiar meadows bear the name of 

 Borreguiles, and are particularly distinguished by their vegetation 

 from the rest of the snow-region. Excepting these green meadows the 

 snow -region presents from a distance a forbidding and seemingly 

 quite sterile appearance, for nothing is seen but gray boulders of 

 slate ; but between the several masses of this rock grow a number of 

 small alpine plants, often scarcely an inch high, mostly in thick 

 patches. The beautiful Ptilotrichum spinosum, Boiss., which ascends 

 from the valleys of the lower alpine region up to the highest summits 

 of the snow-region, is generally diffused and very frequent. Besides 

 this, the following plants occur on almost every part of the summit : 

 — 1. In the upper alpine region : Senecio Tournefortii, Lap., /3. gra- 

 natensis, Boiss., very frequent on moist loose masses of rock ascend- 

 ing into the snow-region ; Thymus angustifolius , Pers. ; Dianthus 

 brachyanthuSy Boiss. (here and in the snow-region scarcely an inch 

 high, whilst in the limestone alps it reaches a height of from half a 

 foot to one foot) ; Plantago serpentina, Vill. ; Jurinea humilis, DeC 

 Eryngium Bourgati, Gou., also in the snow-region ; Armeria allioides 

 Boiss., especially on steejD rocky declivities ; Hieracium Pilosella, L. 

 var. incanum, Boiss. ; Arenaria tetraquetra, L., var. granatensis 

 Boiss., in the thickest beds up to the highest summit of the snow 

 region, mingled here and there with a small form of ^. Armeriastriim 

 Boiss. — 2. In the lower snow-region, at about 8500 to 9500 feet 

 Arenaria tetraquetra, L., var. A. pungens, Clem.; Ptilotrichum pur 

 pureum, Boiss. ; Ranunculus demissus, DeC, var. hispanicus, Boiss. 

 Plantago nivalis, Boiss., on moist and grassy loose masses of rock, on 



