LICHENS AND COLOUR 73 
late summer, when the green leaves have turned to 
light orange or brilliant red and the Willow catkins 
are covered with open capsules releasing the white 
fluffy seeds, the ground becomes a mosaic of colour 
which would be difficult to match in many more 
favoured lands. 
The influence of Lichens on colour production 
in nature is well illustrated in many parts of Green- 
land; one is reminded of Ruskin’s description: 
Far above, among the mountains, the silver lichen spots 
rest, star-like, on the stone: and the gathering orange 
stain, upon the edge of yonder peak, reflects the sunsets of 
a thousand years....To them, slow-fingered, constant- 
hearted, is entrusted the weaving of the dark, eternal 
tapestries of the hills; to them, slow-pencilled, iris-dyed, 
the tender framing of their endless imagery. 
At the small Settlement of Niakornat (Map B, N) 
the huts of the natives are built close to the beach 
or perched on ledges on the higher ground (Fig. 
32). Seen from a distance the massive and partially 
rounded, though rugged, boulders and hills of vol- 
canic breccia—a rock composed of angular pieces 
of a fine-grained and in part glassy lava embedded 
in a matrix of volcanic ash—produce a particularly 
gloomy impression by the contrast of their dark 
shoulders to the lighter hills near them; but on a 
nearer view the dark surfaces were seen to be 
almost covered with splashes of a vermilion Lichen. 
It is not improbable that, in the menacing head- 
lands that guard the harbour of Niakornat and 
partially encircle the Settlement, we have the relics 
of a vast accumulated mass of ash and splintered 
