158 THE PLAIS'T WORLD. 



there are about a dozen species. Two species of Narcissus are 

 rather connnon in open woods, one of them also on beach sands. 

 Orchids so abound as to form the principal floral attraction of 

 many grassy hillsides from March until May. The most won- 

 derful color displays, however, are due to various yellow-flowered 

 leguminous shrubs, especially various species of broom (J^par- 

 tium. Genista, and Calycotome) which gild many square miles 

 of mountain side during the spring months. Leguminous plants 

 abound every^vhere and it is easy to imagine the difiieulties of a 

 botanist little versed in the systematic part of the subject, eon- 

 fronted with some thirteen Medicagos, twenty-two clovers and as 

 many vetches. Of the Compositae nearly a third of the genera 

 belong; to the chicorv sub-familv, and there is onlv one aster and 

 one golden rod. It is a noteworthy fact that none of the trouble- 

 some weeds in fields and vinevards are familiar to us as imi>ort- 

 ant weeds. A few species, such as Erigeron canadense, the dan- 

 delion, the jimson weed, Solanum nigrum and some nettles and 

 ])igweeds, which are pests of our farms and gardens, occur to a 

 limited extent in cultivated ground throughout the Xeapolitan 

 region. But their most formidable weeds are two species of 

 EupJiorhia, MercuriaJis, Fu))iaria, ConroJrulus, a small helio- 

 trope and several Compositae mostly of the chicory sub-family. 

 Two succulent American plants which are often cultivated, also 

 frequently occur spontaneously, namely, Agave americana and 

 Opuntia Ficus-indica. 



The woody plants of the Xeapolitan flora are moderately 

 xerophytic, as would be expected from the facts that the soil is 

 much of it volcanic, parting readily with its moisture, and that 

 there is a lone,- and nearlv rainless summer. On the island of 

 Capri, during the exceptionally dry summer of the writer's 

 residence there, the total rainfall for four months was only six 

 millimeters, with an average maximum daily temperature of 

 about 26° C, and an average relative humidity at 3 p. m. of 

 55%. Broad-leaved evergreen trees and shrubs, such as the ilex, 

 the carob tree, the olive, the arbutus, the lentisk, the myrtle, the 

 rosemary, the ivy (Hedera Helix), Ehamnus Alaternus and 



