148 NOTES OF A NATURALIST. 



hand, and the continual moisture of Valdivia and 

 Western Patagonia on the other. This is one of the 

 examples which goes to show how much caution 

 should be used in drawing inferences as to the climate 

 of former epochs from deposits of fossil vegetable 

 remains. This instance is doubtless exceptional, but 

 there is some reason to think that what may be 

 called physiological varieties — races of plants which, 

 with little or no morphological change, have become 

 adapted to conditions of life very different from those 

 under which the ancestral form was developed — are 

 far less uncommon than has been generally supposed. 

 It is to me rather surprising that a shrub so orna- 

 mental as the Winter's bark should not be more 

 extensively introduced on our western coasts. It 

 appears not to resist severe frosts, but in the west of 

 Ireland and the south-west of England it should be a 

 welcome addition to the resources of the landscape 

 gardener. Although voyagers have spoken highly of 

 its virtues as a stimulant and antiscorbutic, it does 

 not appear to have held its ground in European 

 pharmacopeias, and I believe that the active principle, 

 chiefly residing in the bark, has never been chemically 

 determined. 



On May 1 1 I proceeded to Santiago. Mr. Drum- 

 mond Hay,* the popular consul-general, who at this 

 time was also acting as the British charge d'affaires at 

 the legation at Santiago, was so fully occupied at the 

 consular court that I was able to enjoy little of his 

 society ; but he was kind enough to telegraph to the 



* The recent untimely death of this valauble official is deplored by 

 all classes in Chili. 



