The Species of the Genus Larix. 47 
attains its best development in these localities. The protected 
spots on the slopes of vallies with the fresh, well-drained 
soil are those where the finest examples are found, even 
though they appear to demand a greater degree of humidity 
on the more southerly than the {more northerly situated 
localities (Maxim. 1859, pp. 393—394, and Mippr. 1867, p. 
540). The fact that L. Gmelini is most common in localities 
shunned by other trees, is in agreement with its light- 
loving characteristic. It may be expressed as follows: it is 
excluded from richer soil by coniferous trees more tolerant 
of shadow (Abies sibirica, A. sachalinensis, Picea obovata, 
P. jezoensis, P. Glehnii, Pinus silvestris, P. cembra var. sibirica, 
and P. pumila), and is only deserted by them under the 
most unfavourable growing conditions, which the larch 
has greater capabilities of withstanding than the other 
species. Pinus pumila is its closest competitor, and may 
perhaps even be said to surpass it with regard to the 
elevalions at which it can exist. 
TRAUTVETTER’S first detailed description of L. Gmelini 
with illustrations is based upon specimens collected by 
MIDDENDORFF near Novaja at lat. 72'/2° N., and thus ori- 
ginates from „Die an der äussersten Baumgränse stehende 
Lärche des Taimyrlandes”, as MippENpDORFF himself ex- 
presses it (l. c. p. 748, Note), that is to say, from the 
same region as MIDDENDORFF’sS illustration (reproduced 
here) of the most stunted specimen. A just estimation of 
L. Gmelini as a valuable forest tree widely distributed in 
Eastern Siberia, and not merely as a dwarf growth on 
the forest-line towards the Polar Sea, as Mayr still regarded 
it when he described the larch on the Kurile Islands (Mayr: 
1890, p. 99), has been arrived at from the descriptions 
given by Mippenporrr himself, and from the accounts of 
