THE NORTH POLAR BASIN. 381 



THE TUNDRA. 



Tlie Arctic Sen, which lies at tlie bottom of the Polar Basin, is fringed 

 with a belt of bare country, sometimes steep and rocky, descending iu 

 more or less abrupt cliffs and piles of precipices to the sea, but more often 

 slojjing gently down in mud banks and sand hills representing the 

 accumulated spoils of countless ages of annual tloods, which tear up 

 the banks of the rivers and deposit shoals of detritus at their mouths, 

 compelling them to make deltas in tlieir efforts to force a passage to 

 the sea. In iSforway this belt of bare country is called tlie fjeld, in 

 lUissia it IS known as the tundra, and in America its technical name is 

 the barren grounds. In the language of science, it is the country 

 beyond the limit of forest growth. 



In exposed situations, especially in the higher latitudes, the tundra 

 does really merit its American name of barren ground, being little else 

 than gravel beds interspersed with bare patches of peat or clay, and 

 with scarcely a rush or a sedge to break the monotony. In Sibeiia, at 

 least, this is very exceptional. By far the greater part of the tundra, 

 both east and west of the Ural Mountains, is a gently undulating plain, 

 full of lakes, rivers, swamps, and bogs. The lakes are diversified with 

 l)atches of green water plants, amongst wLiu;h ducks and swans float 

 and dive; the little rivers flow between banks of rush and sedge; the 

 swamps are masses of tall rushes and sedges of various species, where 

 l)lialaropes and ruffs breed, and the bogs are brilliant with the white 

 tiuffy seeds of the cotton grass. The groundwork of all this variegated 

 scenery is more beautiful and varied still, — lichens and moss of almost 

 every conceivable color, from the cream colored reindeer moss to the 

 scarlet-cupped trumpet moss, interspersed with a brilliant alpine flora, 

 gentians, anemones, saxifrages, and hundreds of plants, each a picture in 

 itself, the tall aconites, both the blue and yellow s[)ecies, tlu' beautiful 

 cloudberry, witli its gay white blossom and amber fruit, the fragrant 

 Ledum palustre, and the delicate pink Andromeda polifolia. In the 

 sheltered valleys and deep water courses a few stunted birches, and 

 sometimes large patches of willow scrub, survive the long severe win- 

 ter, and serve as cover for willow grouse or ptarmigan. The Lapland 

 bunting and red-throated pipit are everywhere to be seen, and certain 

 favored places are the breeding-grounds of plovers and sandpipers of 

 many species. So far from meriting the name of barren ground, the 

 tundra is for the most part a veritable paradise in summer. But it has 

 (Uie almost fatal drawback — it swarms with millions of inos(]uitoes. 



ARCTIC FORESTS. 



The tundra melts away insensibly into the forest, but isolated trees 

 are rare, and in Siberia there is an absence of young wood on the con- 

 fines of the tundra. The limit of forest growth appears to be retiring 

 southward, if we may judge from the number of dead and dying stumps; 



