5228 Notes of a Tour in Switzerland. 



place in the Helvetic Flora, as a rather doubtful native ;* but nothing 

 that could be mistaken for it, or for any of its countless varieties, pre- 

 sented itself during the course of our Swiss rambles. Nor had it, I 

 may remark, as appeared to me, its exact analogue or corresponding 

 species to take its place in the scale of Nature. I met with no spe- 

 cies of Robertsonian Saxifrage (the London pride family), save the 

 small S. cuneata, the blossoms of which were over. S. rotundifolia 

 was in flower in the Brunig Pass on the 20th of August, and on the 

 Rigi on the 18th; and S. pyramidalis at the fall of the Handek on 

 the 27th ; S. aspera on the Simplon, August 29th ; and its smaller 

 compact variety (?) Bryoidesat the Mer de Glace, September 5th. S. 

 oppositifolia occurred in very many places ; but in every instance the 

 flowers were gone by. It may seem tedious to be thus minute in 

 assigning dates ; but it serves to show the difference which altitude 

 makes in the period of a plant's flowering. Of the four or five last- 

 named species, all but one (S. oppositifolia) usually bloom in our 

 English gardens about the month of May. 



Let the botanist who has the opportunity not fail to pay a visit to 

 the lower glacier at Grindelwald. Close below the termination of the 

 ice, where the water runs in various shallow channels among the 

 bushes and low shrubs, he will find one of Nature's own botanical 

 gardens, ready made to his hand. That very lovely plant, Epilobium 

 rosmarinifolium (of the catalogues), Saxifraga ciesia, S. muscoides, S. 

 androsacea, S. autumnalis and its variety, were here in full beauty, 

 August 23, along with perhaps half-a-dozen other Saxifrages, gone to 

 seed, Androsace lactea, and many other interesting plants, more than 

 I can enumerate. It struck me as being one of the richest spots for 

 botanising that I ever met with. Nearly the same remark will apply 

 to the vicinity of the glacier at Rosenlaui. I suppose that the seeds 

 of many plants, or perhaps the plants 'themselves, may from time to 

 time be washed down from above by the waters that issue from the 

 glacier, and that they take root and vegetate as soon as they are clear 

 of the ice. And this may be the reason why the immediate vicinity 

 below a glacier exhibits so large an assemblage of plants, some of 

 which*usually and legitimately belong to still more elevated zones. 



Parnassia palustris grows almost everywhere in Switzerland, not 



* It is inserted both by M. Schleicher and M. Thomas in their Catalogues of 

 Swiss olants; but M. Gaudin, probably a far better authority, though he introduces 

 the plant into his ' Flora Helvetica,' remarks, " Species formosa nusquam in Helve- 

 tia occurrere videtur." — Synopsis Flora Helvetica. 



