THE SCENTED ARCTIC BIRCH. 251 



birches 3 to 4 metres high are met with. " This birch 

 is the sweet scented variety, Betula odorata (Bekst.) ; * 

 on the other hand, contrary perhaps to what we 

 might have expected, in Siberia trees attain a con- 

 siderably higher latitude, for according to the same 

 authority 



" they run to the beginning of the estuary delta, i.e., to 

 about 72 N. As the latitude of the N'orth Cape is 71 2' 40", 

 the wood in Siberia goes considerably further north than 

 in Europe. The outermost trees there, are gnarled half wither- 

 ed larches (Laxix Dahuricd), and Picea obovata, and further 

 east, in Kamschatka, birch." f 



In Arctic America, considerably to the northward 

 of the Great Slave Lake, according to Mr. Warburton 

 Pike there is some well-grown pine timber and in 

 many places the lakes are fringed with dwarf willows 

 and other trees. On the coasts of Alaska too, timber 

 is found at considerable distances to the northward 

 of the arctic circle and the same in Labrador, on 

 the Atlantic side. As regards the antarctic regions, we 

 have been unable to discover any mention of trees 

 seen growing on any of the lands which have been 

 visited by the few explorers who have thus far visited 

 those peculiarly desolate and stormy shores. 



In the high latitudes of the northern circumpolar 

 area however, it seems that even in Spitzbergen, 

 situated between the 7 6th and 8 ist parallels of latitude, 

 a few very dwarf specimens of tree life are still to be 



* Voyage of the Vega, by Prof. A. E. Nordenskiold, Vol. i, p. 42. 

 (N.B. This remarkable prevalence of sweet scented vegetation in the 

 extremes of heat and cold is a fact deserving of note). 



t Ibid., Vol. i, p. 43. 



The Barren Grounds of Northern Canada, by Warburton Pike, 

 1892, p. 123. 



