20 THE WONDERS OF VEGETATION. 



" A treeless region comes immediately after the 

 first two. The soil is bare, stony, and generally un- 

 cultivated. Yet here and there we saw some fields 

 of chick peas, of oats or of rye the last being found 

 at 3,100 feet above the level of the Mediterranean ; 

 only one shrub, the box, thyme and lavender, and a 

 few other plants, shared with each other these desert- 

 ed regions. Beeches were seen at 4,000 feet. At 

 this height there is very little shelter to be found, and 

 the trees, exposed to the strong action of the wind 

 which bends them down to the ground, are really no 

 larger than bushes. 



" At the height of 5,100 feet the cold is too keen, 

 the summer too short, and the wind too violent to al- 

 low even the beech any longer to thrive. On the 

 Ventoux, as well as on the Alps and the Pyrenees, a 

 coniferous tree is the last representative of arbores- 

 cent plants. It is a very humble kind of pine, called 

 the 'mountain pine.' These pines rise to the height 

 of some 10 or 15 feet in a few sheltered places, but be- 

 come thick shrubs where they are exposed to the 

 wind. They are found at an elevation of 5,430 

 feet, and mark the extreme limit of arborescent vege- 

 tation. 



" Thus the plants teach us, as well as the best ba- 

 rometer, that we have reached the region where trees 

 disappear, but where the botanist will find, with de- 

 light, the plants of Lapland, of Iceland and of Spitz- 

 bergen. In the Alps, this region extends to the lim- 

 its of perpetual snow, the home of eternal winter ; 

 but as the Ventoux rises only to the height of 5,800 



