20 TEN YEAKS IN SWEDEN. 



Of willow the Swedish flora owns at least forty species, 

 twenty of which are peculiar to Lapland, and one, the 

 Salix polaris, grows on Spitzberghen. This and the Salix 

 lierbacea are the smallest plants in the world perfect trees 

 scarce three inches high. And both grow higher up on the 

 fells than any others. 



The Swedish flora owns but two species of heather. 

 The Erica vulgaris, L., the common heather or ling, 

 and the beautiful little cross-leaved heather (E. tetralix, 

 L.). The former is much the commonest and is met 

 with everywhere, marking the place where the pine- 

 forest formerly flourished. In the olden time, forests 

 of fir and pine, covered all the wide sandy spots where 

 nothing else would grow in the north. These forests were 

 burnt up in the wars which in the olden time were con- 

 tinually raging among the savage inhabitants of this land, 

 and such as escaped the fire have since suffered more 

 severely by the axe and the necessities of man. The forests 

 have gradually disappeared, and nothing remains in their 

 place save wide-stretched ' ' heaths " or ' ' hedas " of no ser- 

 vice to any one. I never saw either the broom or gorse in 

 Sweden. 



The following table shows the order in which the com- 

 moner Swedish trees come into bloom and leaf : 



1. The order of blooming of those trees which bloom 

 before the leaves shoot 



1. Hazle . . . . Hasseln 



2. Alder .... Alen 



3. Elm .... Aim 



4. Sallow .... Salg 



5. Several species of Willow Pil 



6. Swedish Maple . . Lon. 



2. The order in which the different trees appear in 

 leaf: 



1. Gooseberry (Krushar) at the same time as 



the Elm blooms 



