310 BOTANICAL INFORMATION, 
by blasting at very many places. In its present state, it is much like 
that through the Trosachs: a rocky bank rises abruptly to the top of 
the ridge, and a wooded slope descends as suddenly from its edge. 
Having descended from the ridge I came here upon the upper limit 
of the chestnut, a tree second in abundance to the oak, gigantic, 
tall, and straight in the trunk. The rising bank is alternately mossy, 
rocky, and clayey, and presents a good geological section, all the way 
along, of the nucleus of Darjeeling spur. Numerous rills cross the 
road, and are margined with herbs, especially Mimulus, Chrysosple- 
nium, and Torenia, Hydrocotyle Nepalensis, &c.;—no grasses. You 
have only to plant the Trosachs, or the rocky country about Killin, with 
the herbs which I enumerated at Pacheem, to represent the scene to 
the eye: the cryptogamic vegetation of either will answer to both, if 
. you do not take the microscope. Raise your eye from the road to the 
tall trees on either hand, or to the mountains beyond, and the scene is 
widely different ; this is far less varied, less picturesque in colour or out- 
line, less stern in proportion to the mei dimensions of the masses, 
but incomparably more grand,—inexpressibly more so to a stranger. 
(To be continued.) 
BOTANICAL INFORMATION. 
PROFESSOR PARLATORE. 
[The accompanying extract of a letter from Professor Parlatore to 
P. B. Webb, Esq., will be read with interest. We have elsewhere 
noticed that this able botanist is engaged on a * Flora Italica.” —Ep.] 
Turin, September, 1849. 
“T cannot help hoping that you will return to Florence, and pass 
the winter there, and continue the * Ethiopico-Egyptian Flora.’ Tt is 
not yet published, but is, for the most part, composed ; and I hope it 
will make its appearance during the month of October. Come, then, 
and aid me to describe the other families, and gratify with your pre- 
sence myself and our good friend Bubani, whom I left in Florence 
when I set off upon my late expedition into Switzerland. My health 
