THE HEATH. 97 



and other small plants. These also spring up, 

 and although there are many which do not arrive 

 at perfection, but wither for lack of moisture 

 before they have attained any considerable size, 

 they fail not to perform the office which they 

 were sent there to fulfil ; their early decay making 

 a speedy addition to the layer of mould from which 

 they originated. By this time the larger creeping 

 mosses have grown up, and execute the double 

 office of sheltering the ground from the rays of 

 the sun, and of conducting moisture through their 

 cellular substance from one part of it to another. 

 By this process a pleasant green turf is speedily 

 formed ; various new kinds of plants spring up, 

 and are matured ; their intermatting roots firmly 

 bind the soil together while they live, and as soon 

 as they die crumble into dust, adding to it a fresh 

 stratum of earth, which is now become fit for the 

 reception of the seeds of larger plants. Thus a 

 regular succession of different forms of vegetable 

 life goes on, from the scarcely perceptible lichen, 

 the humble creeping moss, the annual grass, the 

 tufted herb, the bushy shrub, to the stately oak 

 or pine. This process man assists by clearing 

 away and burning bushes of furze, or heath, 

 adding their ashes to the soil ; and subsequently 

 by ploughing, sowing, and planting ; or he re- 

 tards it by paring off the turf, as soon as it has 

 attained sufficient thickness, and carrying it away 

 for fuel. 



Of the Reindeer Moss, to which I have alluded 

 before, a very interesting description is to be 

 found in " Linnaeus's Flora Lapponica," which I 

 will translate for you. 



" Throughout the whole of Lapland no vegeta- 



H 



