42 BOTANICAL TOUR IN THE 



abundant as it was rare and beautiful. Cerastium alpinum, in 

 two very dissimilar and apparently distinct forms, covered the 

 green grassy sward with which the stones and rocks, the debris 

 of the mountain, are surrounded or partly covered. One of these 

 forms is bushy in its habit, of a hoary aspect, densely invested 

 with a shaggy or woolly covering, rather dwarfish in stature, and 

 bearing on the erect stalks one or two large white flowers. The 

 other forms, except in the magnitude of the flowers, differed but 

 little from C. triviale, which also abounds there. The capsules 

 were not far enough advanced to enable us to detect any distinc- 

 tive character in this organ. The leaves had the same shape, and 

 the stems the same erect, slender, and unbranched habit, which 

 often characterizes C. triviale. The flowers alone obviously dis- 

 tinguished it from that species. About the stones and hollows 

 in the little craggy places which environ the base of this immense 

 almost perpendicular rock, Polystichum Lonchitis, Poly podium 

 Dryopteris, and Cystopteris fragilis abounded. The latter Fern 

 appeared in almost every possible variety of form and size, from 

 an inch to above a foot high, from a large, dilated, luxuriant 

 frond to a stunted size, somewhat resembling Woodsia hyperborea 

 in substance and outline. Of P. Lonchitis there were no very 

 luxuriant specimens at this early period; the longest of them 

 were only about a foot long. Though we have often seen larger 

 fronds, we have never seen them in greater profusion than they 

 are here. 



Higher up, on the ledges and in the crevices of the lofty rocks, 

 several old acquaintances were recognized. One of the most con- 

 spicuous for its foliage, and which gives a character to this savage 

 landscape, is Sedum Rhodiola, only some of it in flower, seated 

 often on inaccessible cliffs, and enjoying the dripping moisture 

 which abounds on these crags. The last time we saw this plant, 

 growing wild, was on the Foalfoot of Ingleborough. There the 

 plant had long passed its prime (we saw it in September) ; here it 

 appeared in all the loveliness of its early bloom. 



But the most showy flowers of these cliffy rocks were those of 

 the Trollius europaus, a plant which had shed its flowers in most 

 localities of a moderate altitude, and was now in fruit. Here 

 however its yellow blossoms, of extraordinary size and brilliancy 

 of colour, remained to remind us of the great elevation to which 

 we had reached, and the much lower temperature of the atmo- 



