Vegetable and Animal 



dead vegetable matter improve the soil by their casts. 

 This, then, can bear more grass which will enable a 

 larger worm population to live. 



Living as we do in a country which is mostly good 

 loam and never destitute of ^' soil," it is not easy to 

 realise how different is the state of an unfortunate vege- 

 table doomed to languish in a purely '' mineral " earth, 

 where there is neither leaf mould nor dead organic 

 matter. 



In such open floras, the occasional visit of an animal 

 will be extremely beneficial, even if it does devour half 

 the year's foliage. 



In the open floras of the Arctic regions, of scrubs 

 and of dry tropical countries as well as in the peat- 

 mosses of this country, this good influence of animals 

 has been pointed out. Mr. Sewell has shown that an 

 abundance of rich grasses and unusual plants char- 

 acterises those islands in Lapland where the gulls 

 breed and where guano is abundant. 



Middendorf has a graphic picture of the desolation 

 and dried up appearance of the Arctic Tundra in 

 Taimyrland. Here and there, in the monotony of its 

 brownish-yellow surface, the eye discovers at once 

 patches of a bright refreshing green. Such spots are 

 invariably near the burrows of the Arctic fox, or where 

 the Samoyeds have folded their reindeer.* 



So also in the dreary and dry scrub which covers the 

 arid Patagonian tableland, vivid patches of green grass 

 are found only at those places to which the guanaco 

 habitually resorts. 



Something of the same kind is said to be visible in 

 India where old sheep-folds or cattle pens may remain 

 green when the ordinary open flora has withered to 

 nothing. 



Even in Scotland, when walking over the dark-brown 



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