270 THE FOREST LANDS OF FINLAND. 
the north southwards beyond the southern limits of Fin- 
land bring about this difference. While the Swedish flora 
numbers some 2330 different kinds of plants—one half 
phanerogamic, the other half cryptogams—the Finnish 
flora numbers only some 900 of each, or 1800 in all. 
But Dr Ignatius, Director of the Bureau of Statistics, 
reported in 1878 :—‘ The Finnish flora at the present time 
comprises 1080 phanerogamic, and 1800 cryptogamic 
plants, without reckoning the fungi, which of themselves 
exhibit as many species as all the other cryptograms 
together.’ 
’ ‘Tt is interesting, writes Dr Helms, ‘to pass by slow 
degrees from death to life, commencing in the extreme 
north-west with the observation of the first indications of 
organic life within the Polar Circle, and tracing its succes- 
sive manifestations till its ever-increasing power of produc- 
tion is seen towards the southern coast of Finland and its 
granitic island archipelago. In the extreme north, on the 
waste steppes, through which flows the Tama, it is with 
great effort apparently that Nature produces a somewhat 
crippled and deformed vegetation. The appearance of the 
country issaddening in the extreme. The dwarf birch and 
the juniper, with the reindeer moss, clothe but sparingly the 
sunny side of the rocks and hills, and a sickly tanne or fir 
tree stands here and there in a mountain kloof. Further 
on we come upon valleys, to which the sharp cutting wind 
cannot gain access. Here the blackthorn, the sweet briar, 
and the aspen expand and develope their leaves with 
astounding rapidity under the glowing sun of the month 
of June, and are seen embosomed in a grass of wonderful 
length growing on the river banks. To the south of 
Utsjoki the pine and the fir, and about the same latitude 
also the mountain ash, begin gradually to make their 
appearance, and with these the list of the more common 
kinds of trees found in Finland may be considered com- 
plete. But pretty far to the north of this the berry- 
bearing bushes of the country, such as the blaeberry, the 
