Ai'iul, 1848. EUROPEAN FLOWERS, Etc. 100 



At about 4000 feet the roacl crossed a saddle, and ran 

 along the narrow crest of a hill, the top of that facing tHe 

 plains of India, and over which is the way to the interior 

 ranges, amongst which Dorjiling is placed, still twenty-five 

 miles off. A little below this a great change had taken 

 place in the vegetation, — marked, first, by the appearance 

 of a very English-looking bramble, which, however, by way 

 of proving its foreign origin, bore a very good yellow fruit, 

 called here the " yellow raspberry." Scattered oaks, of a 

 noble species, with large lamellated cups and magnificent 

 foliage, succeeded ; and along the ridge of the mountain 

 to Kursiong (a dawk bungalow at about 4800 feet), the 

 change in the flora was complete. 



The spring of this region and elevation most vividly 

 recalled that of England. The oak flowering, the birch 

 bursting into leaf, the violet, Chrysosjplenium, Stellaria and 

 Arum, Vaccinium, wild strawberry, maple, geranium, bramble. 

 A colder wind blew here : mosses and lichens carpeted the 

 banks and roadsides : the birds and insects were very 

 different from those below ; and everything proclaimed the 

 marked change in elevation, and not only in this, but in 

 season, for I had left the winter of the tropics and here 

 encountered the spring of the temperate zone. 



The flowers I have mentioned are so notoriously the 

 harbingers of a European spring that their presence carries 

 one home at once ; but, as species, they differ from their 

 European prototypes, and are. accompanied at this elevation 

 (and for 2000 feet higher up) with tree-fern, Pothos, 

 bananas, palms, figs, pepper, numbers of epiphytal 

 Orchids, and similar genuine tropical genera, The uni- 

 form temperature and humidity of the region here favour 

 the extension of tropical plants into a temperate region ; 

 rxactlv as the same conditions cause similar forms to reach 



