Notes on Vancouver and its Neighbourhood. 203 
two species of marsh-loving yellow ranunculus, which make us 
miss the buttercup and daisy all the more. Elder flowers grow 
thickly in the spring; the beautiful Great Epilobe which fringes 
the streams of the Midlands abounds ; the Musk-plant thrives in 
every shady, marshy spot; foxgloves, pink clover, bracken, 
groundsel, all these and a hundred more familiar friends may be 
found. 
But when we come to the wild fruits, though we are equally 
reminded of England, we feel our country possesses only the 
survivals of a much richer flora. Wild apple, cherry, and plum, 
make the woods gay with their white blossoms, whilst raspberries 
appear with a number of species utterly unknown to us. The finest 
of these, locally called the salmon berry, would be well worth intro- 
ducing as an ornamental shrub; its blossoms are larger than those of 
the cultivated strawberry, pink and rosy lilac ; the fruit of the lovely 
shade of warm yellow known as salmon colour, and pleasant to 
eat. The blackberries, which look precisely like those on an 
English hedge, startle one by their flavour, which is much like 
that of a grape grown out of doors in our climate, and not 
remotely like a blackberry. It is impossible to avoid the 
conclusion that we have here a climate and soil admirably 
adapted for the cultivation of all fruits of temperate climates. 
Little in the way of fruit-growing has been done as yet, but the 
little that has been done has had remarkable success, and it is to 
be hoped that in future years we shall not so assiduously obtain 
everything from California as we do now. People do not know 
what a raspberry caz be if they have not tasted the fruit here; 
for my part, I do not like to spoil the flavour with cream. 
Photographs of the forest scenery of British Columbia do 
it scant justice. The great height, and possibly the dark 
colours of the pines, make them appear to be the only trees. 
Whereas in walking through the forest you hardly catch sight of 
the tall tops of the pines, and the eye is delighted with a profusion 
of deciduous trees and shrubs, among which the most beautiful is 
the maple. Every fallen trunk is covered thickly with tiny pines, 
ferns, and exquisite mosses, and the standing trees are often 
covered to a great height with the latter, the grey-bearded, weird, 
long-hanging, Spanish moss being the most conspicuous of all. 
Here and there the uncanny Devil’s club appears, a very Arab 
among plants in its uncompromising hostility to man and beast. 
Its long, thin, grey stems are beset with poisonous thorns, and so 
is the whole surface of its broad green leaves, which it spreads 
abroad, unabashed, as if to say ‘“‘ Here I stand, and what plant 
dares grow under my poisonous shade, and what creature dares 
touch me?” 
Though the plants, as I have before said, bear a strange resem- 
