518 THE VEGETABLE WORLD. 
the animals which browse it, are even more interested than 
they in the nature of climate. Each country, each changing 
degree of temperature, has its particular plants. We find at the 
foot of the Alps the plants of France and Italy ; at their summit 
we find the plants of the frozen North; and the same northern plants 
we find again at the summit of the mountains of Africa. Upon 
the range of the hills which separate the Mogul empire from the 
kingdom :of Cashmere, we find on the southern slopes many of 
the plants of the Indies, and it is not without surprise that we 
find on the north flanks many of those of Europe. It is also 
from the extremes of climate that we draw our drugs, perfumes, 
and poisons, and all the plants whose properties are in excess. 
Temperate climates, on the contrary, only produce temperate 
things; the mildest of herbs, the most wholesome of legumes, the 
most refreshing of fruits, the quietest of animals, the sais polished 
of men, are the heritage of the mildest climates.”’ 
. Such are the views with which men of genius and foresight 
sicelnsded the discoveries of our times concerning the geographical 
distribution of plants. 
At the commencement of. the sighteaath century Geographical 
Botany was in a manner created by Alexander von Humboldt, 
whose genius is so universal that his traces are found in connection 
with every modern science. On his return from his voyage to the 
equinoctial regions of America, Von Humboldt, in one of his finest 
memoirs, demonstrated that it is the predominance of certain forms 
of vegetation which enables us to recognise a country immediately. 
A forest of Firs and Pines transports us at once to the northern 
or to the high mountain ranges of Europe; the Oaks and Beeches 
to the temperate zone; the Olives to the south, and the Palms 
into intertropical regions; the Cape of Good Hope is the country 
of the Heaths, and Mexico is perhaps the country most typical of 
the Orchids. 
In another memoir Humboldt attempted to estimate the total 
number of plants diffused over the surface of the globe, and the 
influence of climate upon their distribution. For the first time 
he established clearly that localities, each equally distant from the 
equator, and at an equal elevation above the level of the sea, 
might nevertheless have climates very little resembling each 
