310 VIEWS, &C. PHYSIOGNOMY OF PLANTS. 



and other feature."* Is there an Erica in Central Asia? 

 That which Saunders, in Turner's "Travels to Thibet,"* has 

 described in the highlands of Nepaul, besides other European 

 plants (Vaccinium Myrtillus, and V. oxycoccus), as Erica 

 vulgaris, is, according to the opinion communicated to me by 

 Eobert Brown, probably the Andromeda fastigiata of Wallich. 

 The absence of Calluna vulgaris and of all species of Erica, 

 throughout the whole of the continental part of America is an 

 equally striking fact, since Calluna is met with in the Azores 

 and in Iceland. It has not hitherto been found in Greenland, 

 but it was discovered some years ago in Newfoundland. 

 The natural family of the Ericaceae is also almost entirely 

 wanting in Australia, where its place is supplied by the 

 Epacrideae. Linnaeus described only 102 species of the genus 

 Erica, but, according to Klotzsch's observations, this genus 

 comprises 440 true species, after the varieties have been 

 carefully excluded. 



(20) p. 226" The Cactus form" 



When the natural family of the Opuntiaceae is separated 

 from the Grossulariaceae (species Ribes), and is confined within 

 the limits indicated by Kunth,^; we may regard the whole as 

 exclusively American. I am not ignorant, that Roxburgh, 

 in the Flora indica (inedita), mentions two species of Cactus 

 which he regards as peculiar to the south-east of Asia, viz. , Cactus 

 indicus, and C. chinensis. Both are widely diffused, originally 

 wild or having become so, and different from Cactus opuiitia 

 and C. Coccinellifer ; but it is remarkable that this Indian plant 

 should have no ancient Sanscrit name. The so-called Chinese 

 Cactus has been introduced by cultivation into the island of St. 

 Helena. Modern investigations, prosecuted at a period when 

 a more general interest has been awakened in relation to the 

 original distribution of plants, will unquestionably remove the 

 doubts that have frequently been advanced against the exist- 

 ence of Asiatic Opuntiaceae. We see, in a similar manner, 

 certain vital forms appear separately in the animal world. 



* Botany of the Antarctic Voyage of the Erebus and Terror, 1844, 

 p. 210. 



f Philos. Transact., vol. Ixxix. p. 86. 

 % Handbuch der BotaniTc, s. 609. 



