992 Report on subjects comiected with Afghanistan. [No. 120. 



Extent of Mediterranean Province — Few things can be more strik- 

 ing or worthy of comprehensive investigation than this vast extent of 

 the Mediterranean or Australo-Earopean Botanical province. Dr. 

 Falconer told me, that he had ascertained it to prevail a long way to 

 the northward and eastward of Afghanistan ; and I have materials 

 for shewing, that it characterizes the country on the N. face of the 

 Paropamisus, between Maim una and Bamean, and from the mission of 

 MeyendorfF to Bokhara, to which my attention was directed by Sir 

 A. Burnes, it is evident that it equally characterizes Bokhara, and the 

 country between it and Orenburgh. 



On this subject, 1 shall enter into details in the purely botanical 

 part of my report, which I shall have the honour of submitting with 

 the arranged collection. 



Features of the Afghan Flora. — The striking features of the Flora 

 as compared with India, are the scarcity, generally amounting to abso- 

 lute want, of indigenous trees, a general poverty in variety of form, the 

 general prevalence of forms characteristic of Southern Europe, the 

 abundance of the large European families, such as cruciferous, umbel- 

 liferous, &c. plants, and of those forms of Compositse known to Bo- 

 tanists as Cynarocephalise, and of which thistles may be mentioned as 

 familiar instances ; the common occurrence of bulbous monocoty- 

 ledonous plants, such as Tulips, Hyacinths, Onions, &c. the nature of 

 its grasses, and the scarcity of Orchidlese and Ferns, which may be said 

 to exist only in Eastern Afghanistan. 



The number of aromatic plants, the prevalence of thorny species, 

 and the very general occurrence of the flowering periods in the spring 

 months, are also deserving of notice. 



From almost all the forms being what are called European, it fol- 

 lows that no transition in form occurs consequent on variation of ele- 

 vation, similar to that which has been s.o much noticed by all travel- 

 lers in the Himalayas, and other high Indian ranges. In this we are 

 accustomed to associate height with the appearance of forms familiar 

 to our earlier days. In Afghanistan it is not so, and it is remarkable 

 enough, that even the summer Floras of its lowest parts, which have as 

 high a mean summer temperature perhaps as any in the world, are 

 still characterised by a majority of European forms. In high or in 

 low, in hot or in cold situations throughout Afghanistan, forms charac- 



