390 Scientific Intelligence — Geology. 



sub-genera of Antelopes ; but its Fauna certainly appears to be much 

 more similar to that of the tropical regions of Africa than its Flora. 



In Abyssinia alone, as it would seem, do any of the dominant and 

 characteristic forms of the Cape Flora reappear. The beautiful blue 

 water-lily, indeed, has been supposed to be common to Egypt and 

 South Africa, but the forms of the plant occurring in these two 

 countries are a little different, and are considered by De Candolle as 

 distinct species ; their distinctness, however, may perhaps be doubt- 

 ful. 



The vegetation of the Cape is most strikingly different from that 

 of Buenos Ayres in South America, which lies nearly in the same 

 latitude, and has nearly the same mean temperature. It is not 

 merely that the species, the genera, and the prevailing tribes of 

 plants are different, but the whole aspect of the vegetation is dissimilar. 

 A very large proportion of the Cape plants are shrubs ; those of Buenos 

 Ayres, are almost entirely herbaceous. Both countries agree, in- 

 deed, in the very great scarcity (generally speaking) of trees, a 

 scarcity which is much less surprising on the arid rocks and stony 

 wastes of South Africa, than on the marly plains of the Rio de la 

 Plata. Nearly all the I'emarkable families of plants which predomi- 

 nate at the Cape, are wanting in the Buenos Ayrean region, where 

 the prevailing forms are a great variety of Nightshades, Tobaccos, 

 Petunias, Nicrcmhcrgias, and plants allied to these, numerous Ver- 

 benas, Amaranths, Chenopodmms, Mallows, and Grasses. Some gay 

 flowered plants of the Iris and Amaryllis fiimilies, which grow in great 

 abundance on the banks of the Rio de la Plata, are nearly all that 

 shew an affinity to the Flora of the Cape. 



On the other hand, the botany of Australia, in the same latitude, 

 seems to have manj^ striking points of similarity to that of the Cape 

 of Good Hope. This similarity appears both in the general exter- 

 nal aspect of the vegetation, and in the presence of several remark- 

 able families of plants common to both countries ; in particular, the 

 Pi'oteacea3 and Restiacese. On the other hand, there is a remarkable 

 difference between them, in the absence from Africa of the Eucalypti, 

 or gum trees, and which constitute the great bulk of the vegetation 

 of Australia. — Bunhury on the Cape of Good Hope, p. 220. 



GEOLOGV. 



9. Geology and Physical History of the Globe. — M. Elie de 

 Beaumont communicated a letter from M. Hommaire de Hell, dated 

 Tauris, of the 25th Nov. 1847, and containing different observa- 

 tions and researches already made by him. during a journey in which 

 he is engaged in the country washed by the Black Sea. 



He has observed that the volcanic rocks which border the northern 

 part of the Bosphorus, are continued without interruption as far as 

 Kilia and Kirirkaia, to about six leagues of the strait. On this 

 line, as along the other parts of the coast of Bomelia and Bulgaria, 



