132 EEV. G. HENSLOW — ORIGIN- AND DISTEIBTJTION 



no forms peculiar to Great Britain whatever ; with one or two 

 exceptions (e.g. Eriocaulon septangular e), every plant may be found 

 on the Continent. 



Although our British plants are almost all European, yet they 

 arc not equally or at all uniformly distributed over our territory. 

 They have, consequently, been divided into sub-floras or florul<z^ 

 each being more or less restrictive in area. We are indebted 

 mainly to the labours of the late Professor Edward Forbes and 

 Mr. H. C. Watson for tracing out these districts. The following 

 is a comparative table of the respective results of these eminent 

 botanists, with their nomenclatures : — 



Watson's. Forbes'. 



1. British corresponds with \ 



2. English ,, > Germanic. 



3. Scottish ,, ) 



4. Highland ,, Alpine. 



5. Germanic (in part) ,, Kentish. 



6. Atlantic „ \ ^^^^^i^^' 



7. Local or doubtful. 



( Armorican. 



That entitled Germanic by Forbes is so called because it is 

 identical with the German flora, though the latter contains many 

 plants wanting in England. This is subdivided by Watson into 

 (1) the British, which includes plants found in all his eighteen 

 " provinces " ; (2) the English, which includes plants found chiefly 

 in England and not in Scotland; and (3) the Scottish, embracing 

 plants found chiefly in Scotland and the North of England only. 

 The Alpine of Forbes or the Highland of Watson includes a group 

 of arctic plants found on the Scandinavian mountains and on alpine 

 localities, but not in the intermediate temperate lowlands. Watson's 

 Germanic takes in plants found in the east and south-east of England 

 bordering the German Ocean, from whence he derives the name, 

 and includes those plants called Kentish by Forbes, but which do 

 not seem to be deserving of a special name, as they are chiefly, if 

 not always, plants affecting a limestone or chalky soil, and which, 

 in part, occur elsewhere. The Atlantic types of Watson embrace 

 plants found in the west and south-west of England and in 

 Ireland. In these are included the Armorican of Forbes, which is 

 characterised by a group of plants found in Normandy, the Channel 

 Islands, the south-west of England, extending (in part) some dis- 

 tance along the west coast, and in the south-east of Ireland. The 

 number of peculiar species continually decreases in passing in a 

 north-westerly direction from their original home in Normandy ; 

 so that while several which are in the Channel Islands are wanting 

 in the south-west of England, others which reach that comer 



to each natural order ; whereas in Great Britain the average is 14 species to one 

 natural order. It may be added that the probable proportion of species of 

 plants on the globe to the kno-\vn number of natural orders exceeds 350 to 1." 

 — Hooker, ' Introductory Essay to the Flora of New Zealand,' p. xxviii (1853). 



