A PASSING GLANCE AT THE FLORA OF PALESTINE. 179 
from their brethren in Syria. And the Spaniards in turn, being 
struck with the resemblance of the Larch of Europe in many 
respects to the African Cedar, applied to it the Moorish name; 
and from the Spaniards we obtained our English word. The 
Cedar during the Tertiary period extended from the Himalayas 
to the Atlas Mountains ; and the groves of Lebanon, the Deodars 
of India and North Africa, are the relics at present surviving. 
Of the 3,100 species of plants that have been catalogued as 
having been observed or gathered in the Holy Land, about 500 
are common British wild flowers. Some of them, like the Shep- 
herd’s Purse, are ubiquitous, being found on the shores of the 
Dead Sea and on the heights of Hermon ; and the different kinds 
of Crane’s-bill cling about the walls and ruins of the hill country 
of Judea, as they cling about our own banks and dykés; and the 
sight of these familiar plants in such new and strange associations 
awakens pleasant thoughts of home in the mind. The common 
Bramble lays hold of the skirt of the Jew in the neighbourhood of 
Jerusalem as it bids the unsuspecting Gentile ‘“‘ bide awee” when 
he too-hurriedly passes through a wood in the vicinity of Glasgow! 
In the broad pool formed by the overflowing of a fountain in 
the hollow below Bethel, I was delighted to see, covering the whole 
surface with a sheet of dazzling white bloom, the Ranwnculus 
aquatilis, which is so common in our own ponds. And at Banias, 
close beside the source of the Jordan, I was struck with the 
_ western appearance of everything. It seemed like a bit of Scot- 
land accidentally introduced into the oriental world. The trees 
were very like our own Oaks, and Willows, and Poplars; the 
weeds were actually our own Buttercups, Poppies, Fumitories, 
Mallows, Water-cresses, Nettles, and even Docks. And I was led 
to reflect how by a sutlicient amount of moisture and shade, 
creating the conditions of a northern climate, a northern type of 
plant-life can be naturally introduced into almost any part of a 
semi-tropical region. High up towards the source of the River 
Pharpar, issuing from the snows of Hermon, I gathered on its 
banks the round luxuriant clusters of the Ozxyria reniformis, 
which the waters had brought down from the summits, just as I 
had gathered them in the island above Tay Bridge at Aberfeldy, 
to which they had been brought by the flooded waters that swept 
down the sides of Ben Lawers ; and as I tasted the refreshing acid 
