TOURADONS OF THE RHONE 



Theophrastus speaks of those in the Persian gulf, and 

 that exceedingly shrewd botanist has some valuable notes 

 about them worth reading even to-day.^ 



In temperate countries, such as our own, the districts 

 where great rivers enter the sea are for the most part aguish 

 and rheumatic, but, of course, there is nothing so startling 

 and extraordinary as the mangrove swamps. 



Yet, even in temperate countries, the work of winning or 

 gaining new land plods steadily onwards, and it is performed 

 by humble, inconspicuous little plants. 



Where the Rhone enters the Mediterranean, there are 

 some 40,000 acres of sandy and clayey land called the 

 Camargue. The bare sand near the sea is often flooded and 

 swept by violent storms in winter ; anything which tries to 

 grow there is usually carried ^ off and destroyed. 



But, after a time, one finds here and there a solitary plant 

 of a kind of Saltwort {Salicomia macrostachya) which has 

 withstood the strain : its branches gather a little sand and 

 hold it together, and its roots gradually explore and tie 

 down the soil around it. Next winter it can stand the sweep 

 and scour of the stormy water ; next summer other plants 

 begin to grow on this tiny sand-heap, and the " touradon," as 

 it is called, is now fairly well established. It goes on growing 

 until it may be, after a few years, six feet in diameter. 



Eventually the salt gets washed out of the soil and these 

 little heaps become united by a continuous covering of green 

 plants in which shrubs and then trees begin to grow.^ By this 

 time of course the sand has accumulated farther out to sea 

 and the same process is going on there. 



^ Drude, Lc. ; Schimper, ^c; Warming, I.e.; Colonial Beports^ No. 

 3, Miscellaneous. Schimper, Indo-Malayische Strandfiora. 

 '^ Flahault, after Schimper, I.e. 



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