MOUNTAIN' VEGETATION. 125 



Captain Raper, in his Survey of the Ganges, when 

 speaking of the vegetation at a great elevation, mentions 

 similar productions, — especially a species of oak, bearing 

 acorns as large as pigeons' eggs and of the same form, — 

 and abundance of hazel and walnut-trees. 



Of many other European genera we find representatives 

 in these regions, exhibiting a physiognomy derived from 

 their elevated situation, which strikingly corresponds with 

 that of species exposed to a similar temperature in other 

 parts of the world. Roses are found in the tropical, but 

 more plentifully in temperate and frigid regions; whil& 

 brambles delight in the two latter. The genus Pnmida 

 occurs at an altitude of 5000 feet ; Androsace, which is al- 

 ways more truly alpine, at 10,000 feet. On the Himmaleh 

 range we find Geum, and several species of Ribcs (cur- 

 rants). Rhododendrons, Andromedas, and Gualtherias 

 have a range from the temperate to the frigid regions. 

 Rhododendron arhorcum, the most beautiful species of a 

 beautiful genus, rises among the mountains to the height of 

 a tree, with a trunk of above twenty feet, bearing large 

 clusters of vermilion-coloured flowers at the ends of the 

 smaller branches. Rose-coloured and white varieties were 

 found by Dr. Wallich on the verj' summit of the mountain 

 Sheopur, in Xepaul, at an elevation of 10,000 feet. Even 

 the strawberry flourishes, and the nearly-allied genus Po- 

 tentilla furnishes among others two most remarkable species, 

 P. forinosa and atrosaiiguinea, which, for the sake of their 

 fine red flowers, have been transported from the lofty sum- 

 mits of Nepaul to the flower-gardens of Europe. Among 

 these mountains we also observe a species of Cypripcdium, 

 nearly allied to the European and American ones. C. re- 

 mtstum and msignc, which differ so much from their con- 

 geners, do not belong to Nepaul, as has been commonly be- 

 lieved, but were discovered, as Dr. Wallich infonns us, on 

 the mountains of Sylhet. At about 1000 feet above the 

 Valley of Xepaul, the genus Pinus, of which eight species 

 are known to inhabit these regions, becomes conspicuous. 

 Some of them are worthy of particular notice, — especially 

 the Prints Deodar, closely resembling the true cedar, and 

 confined to great elevations ; the P. excelsa of the Planfa 

 AsialiccE Rariorcs, a gigantic tree with cones nine or ten 

 inches in leni^th ; and P. Wcbbianaoi Wallich, also an im- 



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