463 Dr. R. C. Alexander's Account of a Botanical 



Maples, especially a form of Acer campestre with blood-red 

 twigs and Samai'ce, and the delicate Spiraa ulmifoliaj which I was 

 also the first to discover in Styria. Among herbaceous plants, 

 Veronica austriaca v. multifida, Centaur ea axillaris, Moehringia 

 Ponce and muscosa, Clematis erecta, Orchis fusca, Vicia tenui- 

 folia, Roth., Lactuca perennis, Epipogium aphyllum, Corallorrhiza 

 innata, and many already mentioned as occurrmg on the Wotsch 

 and about Pettau. A mere catalogue gives a very inadequate 

 idea of the vegetation : it was the proportion in w^hich these 

 plants occurred that struck me at every step. Genista scariosa 

 covering large banks, Hellehorus atrorubens so thick that one 

 could not walk free of it in the woods ; Inula hirta, Hypochceris 

 maculata, and other plants that occur about Gratz only locally, 

 were here frequent and abundant ; different birds and insects ; 

 altogether it appeared not so much a part of Styria as an outlier 

 of a more southern district. One might perhaps say more cor- 

 rectly that it is not, like Upper Styria, hindered by the vicinity 

 of high mountains from developing the climate proper to its 

 degree of latitude. During my visit the ladies accompanied me 

 over the frontier to Klanyecz, where I spent the day and a night 

 in a Franciscan monastery, and made an excursion with one of 

 the good monks up the Kaiserberg, but found the same things 

 as at Wisell : Cynosurus echinatus, Scandix Pecten, Lathyrus 

 Nissolia and Aphaca in the corn-fields; Physalis Alkekengi and 

 Aristolochia Clematitis in most of the vineyards. My visit at 

 Wisell was at the end of May, just as the weather began at last 

 to clear up ; and what with the beautiful scenery, delightful 

 family, rich flora, and different dress and look of the people, who 

 are here pure Croats, I was amply recompensed for almost daily 

 soakings that I had got hitherto on my excursions. The draw- 

 back in this district is the language. The peasantry speak 

 nothing but that of the country, and a different dialect of it in 

 every village. It is even difficult in some places to get a guide 

 who understands German. On the other hand, a Slavonian guide 

 is worth two German ones for hunting out plants and digging 

 them up. They have the character of being sly and tricky, but 

 I suspect the fault lies oftener with the rascally Beamten, the 

 employes of absentee noblemen, using the name of their master 

 to oppress and cheat them. The gentlemen who reside on their 

 estates universally spoke handsomely of them, and as far as I 

 have had the opportunity of judging, they are naturally a much 

 more intelligent people and more capable of attachment than the 

 Upper Styrians. It may seem out of place to speak of the people 

 here, but botanists may be deterred from visiting the most in- 

 teresting part of the Austrian dominions by the ridiculous pre- 

 judices that are entertained against all kinds of Windisch, Croats, 



