GIANTS. 349 



possess a standard of comparison in the spire of the 

 cathedral of Strasburg, the highest of any cathedral 

 of the globe, which sends its lofty pinnacle to the 

 height of four hundred and forty-six feet ; or in the 

 great pyramids of Cheops, four hundred and eighty 

 feet high, which, if raised in our ranges, would be 

 overshadowed probably by Eucalyptus trees." 



In one sense a giant, and in another sense a dwarf, 

 there is no more remarkable plant to be found than 

 that called after the name of its discoverer, Dr. 

 Welwitsch {Wiiicitsc/iia mirabilis). "Several miles 

 before reaching Cape Negro the coast rises to a 

 height of about 300 or 400 feet, forming a continuous 

 plateau, extending over six miles inland, as flat as a 

 table." Amongst the vegetation of this plateau a 

 dwarf tree was particularly remarkable. This, " with 

 a diameter of stem often of four feet, never rose 

 higher above the surface than one foot, and which, 

 through its entire duration that not unfrequently 

 might exceed a century, always retained the two 

 woody leaves which it threw up at the time of ger- 

 mination, and besides these it never puts forth 

 another. The entire plant looks like a round table, 

 a foot high, projecting over the tolerably hard sandy 

 soil ; the two opposite leaves (often a fathom long by 

 two to two and a half feet broad) extend on the soil 

 to its margin, each of them split up into numerous 

 ribbon-like segments." The flowers of this singular 



