93 



or meagerness of the flora depends wholly on soil and water- 

 supply. 



" A comparison was made between the flora of these regions 

 and of the Scandinavian peninsula at the same distance from the 

 pole. At a latitude at which the hardwood forests grow in 

 Sweden, there is found in Greenland only one tree, a small 

 birch, Betiila odorata torhiosa ; and dwarf undershrubs are the 

 only representatives of the woody flora at the same latitude as 

 that in which we find pine and spruce forests in Scandinavia. 



"At the Danish colonies, all south of Lat. 72°, no grains or 

 fruit can be grown, only a few vegetables, as green cabbage, let- 

 tuce, turnips, and parsley. None of them grow as far north as 

 Etah. The only native plants that can be used as food at this 

 latitude are the following : the crowberry, Evipetrum nigrum, 

 and a blueberry, Vacciniuni idighiosiim micfophylhim, of which 

 the fruit is eaten ; a stone-crop, Rhodiola rosea, and the moun- 

 tain sorrel, Oxyria digyna, of which rootstock and leaves are 

 used ; and two scurvy-grasses, Cochlearia groenlandica and C. 

 fenestrata, the foliage of which is used for food and as a remedy 

 against scurvy. 



" The woody plants of Greenland, north of Lat. 72°, consist of 

 small undershrubs : a dwarf birch, Behda flabellifolia ; three wil- 

 lows, Salix groenlandica, S. anglorum, and 6". herb ace a ; the crow- 

 berry and blueberry, mentioned above ; Cassiope tetragona ; and 

 Diapensia lapponica. A few degrees south of Etah the following 

 are added : Phyllodoce coeridea, Andromeda polifolia, Cassiope 

 hypnoides, Chamaecistiis procumbens, Rhododendron lapponicum, 

 and Ledum deciimbens, all of the heath family. The woody 

 vegetation pf Ellesmere Land consists of two willows, the small 

 blueberry, the crowberry, Diapensia lapponica, and Cassiope 

 tetragona. 



" The flora of northern Greenland (north of Lat. J 2°) and Elles- 

 mere Land numbers about 150 species of phanerogams. Of 

 these not more than 100 are found as far north as Etah. Three 

 fifths of the plants are circumpolar, more than one fifth are com- 

 mon to the region and Arctic America, and the remainmg fifth 

 or less are endemic plants or else plants of European origin, that 

 is, also common to Iceland or Spitzbergen. 



