S84 Scientific Intelligence. Meteorology. 



the actual period of its vegetation, you will obtain numbers 

 which are very nearly equal. This result is not only remarkable, 

 inasmuch as it seems to indicate that, under all climates, the same 

 annual plant receives, in the course of its existence, an equal 

 quantity of heat ; but it leads also to a direct practical result in 

 enabling us to decide upon the possibility of introducing any 

 particular vegetable into a country, as soon as we know the 

 mean temperature of the months there. 



4>. Climate of Scandinavia. Mr Forsell, in his very valuable 

 work on the Statistics of Sweden, gives a short but interesting 

 view of its physical characters. Nature, says the Athenaeum, 

 in many regions holds despotic sway, compelling man to re- 

 main a savage; even where human industry has broken this 

 bondage, and civilization has reached its greatest height, it 

 is surprising to what an extent the character of the people de- 

 rives its peculiar form and complexion, from the natural cir-. 

 cumstances in which they are placed. The Scandinavian 

 peninsula, comprising Sweden and Norway, has an extent of 

 6652 Swedish (or 292,700 English) square miles, inhabited by 

 little more than four millions of people. Of that extent the 

 larger share, or 170,240 square miles, belongs to Sweden, the 

 remainder to Norway. In the form of its relief, the peninsula 

 resembles a huge billow, rising gradually from the east, and 

 then, having formed a crest, falling precipitously towards the 

 west. The crest and abrupt aspect of the rocky wave, there- 

 fore, lie almost wholly in the Norwegian territory. More than 

 a third of the peninsula has an elevation exceeding 2000 feet 

 above the sea, and 3696 English square miles of its surface are 

 above the limits of perpetual snow, but the greater part of this 

 snowy region (nearly 3000 square miles) is in Norway. In 

 Sweden, on the other hand, one-third of the country has a less 

 absolute elevation than 300 feet, while little more than a twen- 

 tieth part of its surface lies at a height exceeding 2000 feet 

 above the sea. Thus Sweden, contrasted with Norway, or con- 

 sidered merely in respect to its superficial configuration, seems 

 favoured by nature ; but stretching as it does from Lat. 54 N., 

 through sixteen degrees of latitude (1100 miles) northwards, far 

 within the polar circle, the greater part of the kingdom lies too 

 near the confines of perpetual winter. Between North Cape, 

 where the winds are so violent that the inhabitants are obliged 



