226 ESSAYS, 



now and then, in the lapse of time, by the chance conveyance 

 of seeds across oceans, or even from one mountain to another. 

 The plants of the top of the White Mountains and of Labra- 

 dor are mainly the same ; but we need not suppose that it ir? 

 so because birds have carried seeds from the one to the other/' 



I take it that the true explanation of the whole problem 

 comes from a just general view, and not through piecemeal \ 

 suppositions of chances. And I am clear that it is to be found 

 by looking to the north, to the state of things at the arctic 

 zone, — first, as it now is, and then as it has been. 



North of our forest-regions comes the zone unwooded from 

 cold, the zone of arctic vegetation. In this, as a rule, the 

 species are the same round the world ; as exceptions, some are 

 restricted to a part of the circle. 



The polar projection of the earth down to the northern 

 tropic, as here exhibited, shows to the eye — as our maps do 

 not — how all the lands come together into one region, and 

 how natural it may be for the same species, under homogene- 

 ous conditions, to spread over it. When we know, moreover, 

 that sea and land have varied greatly since these species ex- 

 isted, we may well believe that any ocean-gaps, now in the 

 way of equable distribution, may have been bridged over. 

 There is now only one considerable gap. 



What would happen if a cold period was to come on from 

 the north, and was to carry very slowly the present arctic 

 climate, or something like it, down far into the temperate 

 zone ? Why, just what has haprjened in the Glacial period, 

 when the refrigeration somehow pushed all these plants before 

 it down to southern Europe, to middle Asia, to the middle 

 and southern part of the United States ; and, at length reced- 

 ing, left some parts of them stranded on the Pyrenees, the 

 Alps, the Apennines, the Caucasus, on our White and Rocky 

 Mountains, or wherever they could escape the increasing 

 warmth as well by ascending mountains as by receding north- 

 ward at lower levels. Those that kept together at a low level, 

 and made good their retreat, form the main body of present 

 arctic vegetation. Those that took to the mountains ha(^ their 

 line of retreat cut off, and hold their positions on the moun- 



