18 STATISTICS OF THE ORDER RANUNCULACEA. 
tion of the plants of this Order, we may state that the more 
common species have the largest horizontal area, and that the 
rarer or less common have a less extensive distribution, or cover 
a less area. The most common species are the following, viz. 
the Wood Anemone, the Common Water Crowfoot (R. aquatilis) , 
the Ivy-leafed Crowfoot (R. hederaceus), the three Meadow But- 
tercups (R. acris, R. repens, and Ficaria ranunculoides) ; also R. 
Flammula and Caltha palustris : these are universally distributed, 
being found in most or all of the counties of Great Britain. 
Ranunculus auricomus, R. bulbosus, and R. sceleratus are not so 
widely distributed. Again, Clematis, Adonis, Myosurus, Helle- 
borus viridis, H. fetidus, Thalictrum flavum, T. minus, T. al- 
pinum, Anemone Pulsatilla, Ranunculus hirsutus, R. parviflorus, 
Trollius europeus, Aquilegia, and Delphinium are still more re- 
stricted in horizontal area. Some of them, as the Hellebores, 
Anemone Pulsatilla, Adonis, and Delphinium are only of local 
distribution, and are mostly confined to England. Trollius be- 
longs to those plants which have the Scottish type of distribution ; 
Peonia, Actea, and Aconitum are very local, bemg found only in 
one or two counties respectively; Hranthis is an alien. The 
altitudinal range of the species is also great. The aquatic Ra- 
nunculi, with the exception of R. aquatilis and R. hederaceus, do 
not attain a greater vertical range than 200 yards ; the exceptions 
reach 350 yards and 800 yards in the Hast Highlands and North 
Wales. (See Cybele, in loco.) Some of the same genus, viz. R. 
alpestris and R. acris, reach the limits of perpetual snow; and 
some, as A. repens, R. Flammula, R. bulbosus, and R. auricomus, 
Caltha palustris, Trollius, or some one or other of them, occupy 
all intermediate elevations between the greatest and the least 
altitudes. The rest of the Ranunculi are limited to the coast-line, 
or between that and 200 yards of vertical height ; Actea spicata 
and Trollius Europeus do not quite reach the coast-line. Thalic- 
trum alpinum and T. minus have a very extensive vertical range, 
descending to the coast-line in the north of Scotland, and they as- 
cend to about 800 yards, or even more, in Wales. The former 
does not extend further south than Wales, and the latter, though 
extending further south, is only found in the western counties at 
this latitude. Two species, Peonia corallina and Aconitum Na- 
pellus, are limited to the west of England. Trollius europeus, 
Actea spicata, and Thalictrum alpinum have a preference for the 
