in the extreme North; 101 



brought from the territory of Alaska, where it was collected 

 by a Finnish director of mines, M. Hjalmor Fm'uhjelm. 

 Among these plants there are fourteen species of trees and 

 shrubs belonging to Greenland and Spitzbergen ; and it is a 

 strange thing that these species are almost solely those which 

 lived at the same time in Germany and Switzerland. It is 

 therefore probable that they came from the glacial zone, which 

 was covered by a uniform vegetation. We see some species 

 advance thence as far as Alaska on one side and on the other 

 to Konigsberg : such is Populus ZaddacM. Others go in 

 America to Alaska, and in Europe to Switzerland, such is the 

 marsh-cypress ; others, again, reach in America to Vancouver's 

 Island, in Europe to Greece, and in Asia to the Ural : such 

 are the gigantic trees Sequoia Langsdorjii. 



The presence of these plants in the rocks of countries so 

 distant from each other is certainly remarkable, but it may be 

 easily explained if we reflect that all these trees occur in the 

 glacial zone, that they grew there formerly spontaneously, 

 and that they have spread thence by radiating towards the 

 south. The more they advance towards the south, the more 

 scattered are they. We have seen that in the summer innu- 

 merable birds collect in the polar countries ; they meet there 

 from all parts of the world. In the autumn they separate 

 again to fly away in all directions. What is done in a few 

 months by the birds with their light wings, the plants took 

 centuries and thousands of years to accomplish. Every plant 

 executes a slow and continuous migration. These migrations, 

 the starting-point of which is in the distant past, are recorded in 

 the rocks ; and the interweaving of the carpets of flowers which 

 adorn our present creation retraces them for us in its turn. 

 For the vegetation of the present day is closely connected 

 with that of preceding epochs ; and throughout all these vege- 

 table creations reigns one thought which not only reveals 

 itself around us by thousands upon thousands of images, but 

 strikes us everywhere in the icy regions of the extreme north. 

 Organic nature may become impoverished there, and even 

 disappear when a cold mantle of ice extends over the whole 

 earth : but when the flowers die, the stones speak and relate 

 the marvels of creation ; they tell us that even in the most dis- 

 tant countries, and in the remotest past, nature was governed 

 by the same laws and the same harmony as immediately 

 around us. 



