1858.] NOTES ON THE FLORA OF BRAEMAR. 343 



that it is quite possible it may eventually prove the richest of all, 

 and that more careful hunting will reveal many more of those 

 rare plants formerly supposed to be confined solely to the other 

 two districts, — just as the keen eyes of a Backhouse and a Balfour 

 have already discovered Saxifi'aga rivularis on Ben-na-buird, and 

 Carex rupestris and Astragalus alpinus on Craig-an-dal. 



In beginning however a more detailed account of the plants 

 which characterize each of the above groups, it must be premised 

 that the actual area occupied by most of the rarer species given in 

 the list is in itself very limited. We must not expect to find such 

 comparatively common plants even as Saxifruga oppositifolia or 

 Silene acaulis meeting us at every step as soon as we ascend 

 into the loftier regions, nor are they in any part so universally 

 abundant as we have found Alchemilla alpina, Polygonum vivipa- 

 rum, Arbutus Uva-ursi, etc., to be lower down in the valleys ; while 

 a fortiori the localities of the rarer plants, as Astragalus alpinus 

 and Dryas octopetala, are very restricted indeed. It is true there 

 are a few species which we find generally distributed as soon as 

 we attain a certain elevation, and whose altitudinal limits are 

 well comprised within Mr. Watson's arctic zone of vegetation, 

 such as Rubus Chamamorus, Epilobium alsinifolium and E. alpi- 

 num, Gnaphalium supinum, Azalea procumbens, Betula nana, Vac- 

 cinium uliginosum, Salix herbacea, Polypodium alpestre, Lycopo- 

 dium annotinum, and some few others ; but all these are plants of 

 the heathy moors, and do not need a rocky soil to vegetate and 

 flourish on, like the Saxifrages, Silene, Thalictrum, etc. 



The following list enumerates all the species which have as 

 yet been discovered, to my knowledge, in the mountainous district 

 of Braemar ; at a rough estimate, their lowest altitudinal limit 

 is about 2500 feet, that is to say, we shall rarely find any of the 

 species named at a lower elevation than this. I have marked 

 with an asterisk those plants which frequently, and indeed gene- 

 rally, descend below this limit. The numbers prefixed to the 

 several localities refer to the three districts as given above, within 

 which they are included. 



Thalictrum alpinum. 1 . Cairntoul, Ben-na-buird, Little Craig-an-dal. 

 2. Corry of Loch Ceander. -y 



*Arabis petrcea. 1. Caimtoid, Braeriach, Glen Dee, Linn of Cuaicli 

 (1190 feet), banks of the Ded below Invercauld (1030 feet). 



