622 Foreign Notices ; — India. 



ation are diffused over our planet. The flora of Novai'a Zemlia bears more 

 resemblance to that of the Northern Ural than to that of Finland. It includes 

 all that is known of that of Spitsbergen, besides a few plants which have 

 hitherto been found only in North America. 



Among the laws of the vegetable world peculiar to this frozen region, one 

 of the most striking is, that vegetation is confined to the surface of the soil 

 and the lowest portion of the atmosphere, or just to the plane where the two 

 meet. The plants rise but little above the ground, and penetrate a very short 

 way below it. Plants which, in warmer climates, have perpendicular roots, 

 have them here horizontal, and creeping just beneath the surface of the soil. 

 In fact, the flower, only 1 or 2 inches high, feels the reflected warmth from 

 the dry soil ; its root keeps likewise near the surface, for, if it penetrated 

 downwards, it would soon approach the perpetual ice. This curious charac- 

 teristic is most plainly developed in the arborescent plants. The commonest 

 tree of Novai'a Zemlia is the «Salix polaris, if that may be called a tree which 

 rises little more than half an inch above the moss in which it seems to nestle; 

 there, from a stem about as thick as a quill, it puts forth a pair of leaves and 

 a catkin. Yet it would be a great mistake to suppose this the entire plant ; 

 the tree, in fact, grows along the surface of the ground, barely protruding its 

 little branches through the moss. Another species (S, reticulata) rises to a 

 height of 4 or 5 inches ; but in this, as well as the S. lanata, the giant of 

 these forests, the wood above ground is incomparably less than that which, 

 as stem or root, lies extended on, or buried near, the surface. The latter 

 species rises to a height of 6 or 8 inches ; and M. Baer has traced their 

 stems in the ground a length of 10 or 12 feet without finding their termina- 

 tion ; and thereupon he remarks that a party shipwrecked on Novai'a Zem- 

 lia could never hope to. collect sufficient fuel from the surface of the 

 ground, but below the surface they would probably find it in abundance. 



Not fewer than 90 species of phanerogamic plants, and about half that num- 

 ber of cryptogamic, were collected by M. Baer in Novai'a Zemlia. {Expe- 

 dition to Nova'ia Zemlia, as quoted in the Athenceum, No. 560. p. 507.) 



INDIA. 



The Botanic Garden of Calcutta was established under the direction of 

 Col. R. Kydd, in March, 1768. This garden was quickly enriched with valu- 

 able plants, by means of a correspondence with all the Europeans that had 

 settled in India. There were about 300 species in it, when, in the autumn of 

 1793, Dr. Roxburgh was charged with its superintendence. That botanist 

 established a more active correspondence, and visited himself the coast of 

 Coromandel, and some other provinces of British India. He succeeded in 

 bringing together 3500 species of plants in the Company's garden, and of this 

 number 1510 were previously unknown, and were named and described by 

 him. This we learn from the catalogue of the garden, printed at Serampore 

 in 1814, under the direction of Dr. W. Carey, Dr. Roxburgh's friend. 



This catalogue, which is written on a very contracted scale, makes known 

 the botanical name, the Indian denomination, the native place, and the periods 

 of introduction, flowering, and maturity of each plant. It concludes with an 

 appendix, containing the Indian species not yet introduced into the garden, 

 but known to Dr. Roxburgh. 



That gentleman, however, did not confine himself to this brief indication 

 of his labours, but successively sent to the East India Company numerous 

 drawings and descriptions of the vegetables of India; and the Company made 

 a selection of them, which was published under the direction of Sir Joseph 

 Banks, under the title of Plants of CoromandeL This magnificent work 

 contains descriptions and coloured figures of 300 species of Indian plants, 

 selected from among those preeminent for beauty or utility. But the very 

 magnificence of this publication rendered it impossible to extend it to the 

 whole of the vegetation of India, and Dr. Roxburgh conceived the project of 

 publishing a flora of that country in a simpler form. Unfortunately, however, 

 his health did not permit him to carry into effect this plan. He retired from 



