220 ERICACE^ 



of this plant is said by Gmelin to be very intoxicating, and to be used in 

 Siberia as an inebriating liquor. The plant is also very acrid, and sometimes 

 proves fatal to sheep. Another species, which grows in the United States, 

 A. maridna, is so commonly injurious to these animals, that it has acquired 

 the popular name of Stagger-lamb, or Stagger-bush, because it produces a 

 disease in which they are seized with fits of trembling ; while the A. ovifoUa 

 is said to cause the death of young goats which browse upon its shoots. Our 

 Marsh Andromeda contains some quantity of tannin, and has been used 

 instead of nut-galls. In Lapland large tracts of land are covered as with a 

 moss by the A. hypnoides ; and both in the north of Europe and America 

 several species are used medicinally. The tree Andromeda, found in the 

 valleys of the Alleghany Mountains, is called Sorrel-tree, from its acid leaves, 

 which are used by the hunters to allay their thirst, and from which a slightly 

 acid drink is procured to relieve the thirst in ardent fevers. Sir J. D. 

 Hooker found the A. fasfigiata in such abundance on the mountains of Nepal, 

 that he terms it the Himalayan heather. He says it makes good fuel. 



6. Strawberry-tree (Arbutus). 



Austere Strawberry-tree (A. uneclo). — Stem woody ; leaves elliptical, 

 tapering, serrated, smooth ; flowers in drooping panicles ; fruit rough. No 

 one who has ever visited the Lakes of Killarney can have failed to observe 

 how much their beauty is enriched and varied by the large dark masses of 

 Arbutus which grow about their shores. Were the traveller, indeed, suffi- 

 ciently unobservant to pass them without remark, the boatmen would most 

 surely call his attention to their loveliness ; nor would the visitor fail to be 

 invited to the purchase of some little box, or set of chess-men, or bracelet, 

 made of the beautifully-veined wood of this handsome tree. Mrs. S. C. Hall 

 remarks : " The tourist on approaching the Lakes is at once struck by the 

 singularity and the variety of the foliage in the woods that clothe the hills 

 by which, on all sides, they are surrounded. The effect produced is novel, 

 striking, and beautiful, and is caused chiefly by the abundant mixture of the 

 tree-shrub, Arbutus UTiedo, with the forest trees. The Arbutus grows in nearly 

 all parts of L^eland, but nowhere is found of so large a size, or in such rich 

 luxuriance, as at Killarney. The extreme western position, the mild and 

 humid atmosphere — for in Ireland there is fact as well as fancy in the poet's 

 image — 



" Thy suns with doubtful gleam 

 Weep while they rise," 



and the rarity of frosts, contribute to its propagation, and nurture it to an 

 enormous giowth, far surpassing that which it attains in any part of Great 

 Britain, although, even at Killarney, it is never of so great a size as it is 

 found clothing the sides of Mount Athos. In Dinis Island there is a tree 

 the stem of which is seven feet in circumference, and its height is in propor- 

 tion, being equal to that of an ash-tree of the same girth, which stands near 

 it. There are several others nearly as large, and we believe one or two 

 larger. Alone, its character is not picturesque ; the branches are bare, long, 

 gnarled, and crooked, presenting in its wild state a remarkable contrast to its 

 trim-formed and bush-like figure in our cultivated gardens. Mingled with 



