ILLUSTRATIONS (18). MIMOSAS. 307 



600 to upwards of 700 feet higher, on the declivity of 

 Chimborazo. 



(18) p. 225— •" Form of the Mimosce." 



The delicate and feathery foliage of the Mimosa3, Acacioe, 

 Schrankiee, and Desmanthus, may be regarded as peculiarly 

 characteristic of tropical vegetation; although some repre- 

 sentatives of this form may also be found without the tro- 

 pics. In the Old Continent of the northern hemisphere, 

 and indeed in Asia, I can instance only one low shrub, 

 described by Marshal von Biberstein as Acacia Stephaniana, 

 but which, according to Kunth's more recent investiga- 

 tions, is a species of the genus Prosopis. This social plant 

 covers the arid plains of the province of Schirvan on the 

 Kur (Cyrus), near New Schamach, as far as the ancient 

 Araxes. Olivier found it also in the neighbourhood of 

 Bagdad. It is the Acacia foliis bipinnatis mentioned by 

 Buxbaum, and which extends towards the north as far as 42° 

 lat.* In Africa the Acacia gummifera (Willd.), extends to 

 Mogador, and therefore as far as 32° north lat. 



In the New Continent, Acacia glandulosa (Michaux), and 

 A. brachyloba (Willd.), adorn the banks of the Mississippi 

 and Tenessee, and the Savannahs of the Illinois. The 

 Schrankia uncinata was found by Michaux to penetrate from 

 Florida northwards to Virginia (therefore as far as 37° north 

 lat.). Gleclitschia triacanthos is met with, according to Bar- 

 ton, to the east of the Alleghany mountains, as far as 38° 

 north lat., and west of the same range even to 41° north lat. 

 The extreme northern limit of Gleclitschia monosperma is 

 U\o degrees further southward. Such are the boundaries of 

 the Mimosa form in the northern hemisphere, Avhile in the 

 southern hemisphere, beyond the tropic of Capricorn, simple- 

 leaved Acacise are found as far as Van Dieman's Land; the 

 Acacia cavenia described by Claude Gay being even found in 

 Chili between 30° and 37° south lat.f Chili has no true 

 Mimosa, but three species of Acacia ; and even in the north 

 of Chili the Acacia cavenia grows only to a height of 12 or 

 13 feet, whilst in the south, as it approaches the sea- coast, it 



* See his Tableau des Provinces situees sur la cote occidentale de la 

 Mer Caspienne, entre lesfleuves Terek et Koar, 1798, pp. 58, 120. 

 T See Molina's Storia naturale del Chili, 1782, p. 174. 



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