of the White Mountains. 613 



Very little attention appears to have been directed to 

 this subject in our country, other than in a most general 

 way. The White Mountains of New Hampshire would 

 naturally attract earliest attention by their high elevation, 

 and by the facilities offered to travellers in their vicinity ; 

 but even concerning these, little that is definite has been 

 recorded. Dr. Asa Gray, in his statistics of the Flora of 

 the northern United States,* gives, it is true, separate and 

 very complete lists of alpine and subalpine species of 

 plants ; but the distinction between the two is stated to 

 be, that the former are found only in " our small alpine 

 region," (in which are included all the barren summits of 

 the White Mountains,) and the latter "occur mainly in 

 our alpine region, but are also found decidedly out of it;" 

 so that the lists do not pretend to group together those 

 plants which are found each in a distinct alpine or a sub- 

 alpine region. Prof. E. Tuckerman, in an article upon 

 the Vegetation of the White Hills,f after speaking of the 

 wooded region, says: "Botanists designate the highest, 

 bald disti'ict, with the heads of ravines descending from 

 it, as the alpine region, and have sometimes spoken of a 

 small tract intermediate between the two, but still imper- 

 fectly characterized, as the subalpine region;" and this is 

 the most definite mention of a subalpine, as distinct from 

 an alpine, region which seems to have been made. 



A summer passed at the base of Mount Washington, 

 for the special purpose of collecting the insects of the 

 W^hite Mountains, has given me the opportunity of mak- 

 ing many ascents of this highest peak, and of passing over 

 nearly the whole of the barren summits of this easterly 

 range ; and this frequent passage from one elevation to 

 another, has afforded the surest means of having the at- 

 tention repeatedly drawn to whatever distinctions exist 



* American Journal of Science and Arts, XXII. 281; XXIII. 62-3. 



t The White Hills, their Scenes, Legends, and History, by T. S. King, p. 232. 



