10 8 SCANDINAVIA. 



be absolutely iminbabitable, and Solloisa, or "Sunless," in the Bergen district, is 

 so called because it never receives the direct rays of the sun. 



The climatic anomalies of the western seaboard disappear rapidly as we go 

 eastwards. The mean temperature of the Norwegian coast exceeds by 36° 

 that of its latitude, whereas the excess is reduced to 18° north of Christiania 

 and Upsala. Here the climate becomes continental. Its daily, monthly, 

 and annual deviations are more and more considerable, risuig from 18° on the 

 coast, between July and June, to 54° in Swedish Lapland. In these high 

 latitudes the summers are about as warm as in South Sweden, but the winters 

 are much colder, and the bogs of Lapland remain in some places frozen 

 throughout the year.* 



Scandinavian Flora. 

 Even in the zones of vegetation considerable anomalies occur. Although 

 the mean temperature is everywhere higher on the Norwegian seaboard than on 

 the eastern slopes, several species of trees reach a fiir higher latitude in Sweden 

 than in Norway. Thus the Norwegian pine forests cease about the Norrland 

 frontier at the arctic circle, though they extend much farther north in Sweden. 

 By an analogous phenomenon, the birch, which stops at an elevation of about 1,050 

 feet on the Norwegian slopes, ascends to double that height on the Swedish side. 



Over 2,000 European plants have their northern limit in Scandinavia. A 

 chart exhibited by Schiibeler at the Paris Geographical Congress shows the 

 hitherto determined polar limits of 1,900 cultivated and wild plants of the 

 Norwegian shores. Travelling from south to north and from west to east, we 

 find the plants of the temperate European zone successively disappearing. First 

 is passed the beech and hornbeam zone, comprising South Scania, the Kattegat, 

 and the south-west coast of Norway as far as Bergen, a little to the north of 

 which is found the northernmost beech forest of the globe. The mingling of 

 this light green foliage with the dark conifers forms the great charm of the 

 Christiania coast scenery. 



The oak zone comprises all Central Sweden to the river Dal, and the 

 Norwegian coast to the neighbourhood of Christianssund. The v/hite alder, the 

 pine, fir, and birch extend much farther north, and attain higher elevations on 

 the hillsides, the birch flourishing even on the Finmark plains. The absolute 

 tree-line takes in but a very small part of Norway about the northern shores of 

 the Varanger- fiord. The southern shores are fringed with veritable forests of 

 pine, fir, birch, aspen, elder, and service trees. 



All the Scandinavian species are exotics, which have occupied this region 

 ^ince the glacial period. Yet so deep is the verdure of the foliage, so vivid the 

 colours of the flowers, that most botanists might fancy themselves in the presence 



Temperature. Rainfall. 



Lat. Mein. Janiwry. July. in. 



Hammerfest . . 70° 7' -iô^ 2'6° 52^ — 



Bergen . . . 60 4 4ô 23 58 71 



Christiania ... 59 54 41 23 61 21 



Stockholm . . . 59 20 41 25 60 20 



Goteborg . . .57 42 44 29 61 21 



