Fes. 1910.] BOTANICAL SOCIETY OF EDINBURGH 75 
Among alien flowers growing wild about Valparaiso 
are:—Hschscholtzia californica, Argemone mexicana, and 
Centawrea melitensis. The Hschscholtzia escaped from 
the garden of an English lady living in Vina, a suburb of 
Valparaiso, about forty years ago. Aided by an excellent 
seed-dispersal mechanism, it spreads along the cliffs and 
railway embankments, and wherever the ground is broken, 
However, one occasionally meets with an isolated patch of 
it miles from any other specimens. Growing in great 
orange masses on the cliffs between Vina and Valparaiso, 
it forms a spectacle of the most dazzling brilliance. 
A great many of the plants about Valparaiso and in the 
comparatively dry parts of Chile are aromatic. Some 
people say that they can smell Chile when miles out to 
sea. <A large proportion of the plants in such a neighbour- 
hood are prickly. specially is this the case with the very 
small plants. The ground feels prickly to the hand. 
Shortly after arriving in Valparaiso, I travelled south 
and visited Temuco and Valdivia. Unfortunately I had 
no apparatus with me for collecting and drying plants, 
owing to some of my property having been stolen from the 
steamer on the way to Valparaiso. 
In passing through the Great Central Valley, Chile’s 
greatest agricultural asset, I was much struck by the alien 
flora. The growth of bramble was such as no one who 
had not seen would believe. It grew fifteen feet up 
the poplars lining the fields, and at the same time formed 
hedges about six yards broad. In some places it grew 
entirely by itself, the interlacing stems forming dome- 
shaped masses about six feet high. An immense total of 
valuable farm-land is thus wasted by being covered by 
this persistent and useless bush. When once the bramble 
has taken root, its eradication from the soil is a matter of 
great difficulty. Various expedients have been tried. One 
method is to burn the bushes, and then fence in the site, 
turning goats into the enclosure. The animals eat off the 
new shoots as soon as they appear; and, in the course of 
time, the roots die. Some parts of the land were overrun 
by that handsome artichoke, the cardoon (Cynara car- 
dunculus), which, however, attains its maximum develop- 
ment on the plains of the Argentine. 
