MAY. 81 



heaths are very fragrant, and our common 

 British heaths are, as well as the exotics, very 

 beautiful flowers. 



' Sometimes with bells like amethysts, and then 

 Paler and shaded like the maiden's cheek 

 With gradual blushes ;— other while, as white 

 As rime that hangs upon the frozen spray.' 



These bear the bleakest Avinds of the moor- 

 lands, and all heaths, growing as they do, when 

 wild, on open lands, require so much air and 

 light, that, as has been said of them, ' it may 

 be taken as a proverb, that heaths like to feel 

 the wind between every leaf.' " 



The androincdas, some of which blossom in 

 this month, are very similar to the heaths, and 

 are very ornamental Uttle plants, or low ever- 

 green shrubs, chiefly natives of North America. 

 Several of them grow wild in Lapland. The 

 moss-like sj)ecies, {Anch'omedahypnoides,) which 

 has the appearance of a beautiful moss, spreads 

 over immense tracts of ground on the higher 

 regions of Lapland, adorning them with its red 

 blossoms, which, with many other lovely blooms, 

 thicken their surfaces, and are included by the 

 Laplanders under the general name of ren- 

 blomster, or reindeer flowers, as that animal 

 feeds on the pasturage where they grow. The 

 marsh species (^Andromeda polifoUa) is a native 

 of some parts of Great Britain, and is the most 

 common in the garden. Linnajus found it in 

 Sweden, and names it as decorating the marshy 

 grounds during summer, in the most agreeable 

 manner. The flowers he describes as of a 



