Appendix.] of high Mountains. 21 



grow wild in the same places, and follow the same route. The 

 Anthericum Bicolorum of Algiers, traverses the same chain of 

 mountains, and arrives in Anjou. The Scilla Umbellata and Crocus 

 Nudiftorus, have migrated from the Pyrenees even into England. 

 Yet not one of the ahove mentioned vegetables has been dissemi- 

 nated laterally, to meet those southern ones which have crossed 

 the Swiss Alps. 



But it is in the great valleys of the Pyrenees, extending from 

 north to south, that these vegetable galaxies become most strik- 

 ing and singular. The Dianthus Superbus runs through the whole 

 valley of Campan and Gavarnie, without ever entering any of the 

 side ones. The Vtrbascum Mtfcoai, that beautiful and scarce plant, 

 which does not belong either to the genus in which Li nn^eus has 

 placed it, or perhaps to any natural order yet defined, and which 

 has so exotic an appearance, that it distinguishes itself, like the 

 Kingfisher, among our indigenous birds, invariably keeps to the 

 same direction. Nothing is more abundant in all the great valleys 

 of the Pyrenees, in every soit and exposition : yet the very same 

 soil and exposition never attract it to any of the collateral ones. 

 I could cite a multitude of similar examples, but it is sufficient at 

 present, to mention one more, the Box Tree. This shrub, so very 

 robust, is affected by elevation like the most delicate ones. At 

 the base of the Pyrenees, both on the French and Spanish side, it 

 covers every hill : from thence it enters the great valleys, running 

 from the north-east towards the south, but never quits them; in 

 vain do the numerous branches of these valleys offer it an asylum ; 

 passing their openings, it keeps to its first direction, stopping on 

 the crest of the chain at about 2000 metres above the level of 

 the sea, and appearing again on the other side at a similar eleva- 

 tion, and in a similar direction, from which it never deviates. 



Thus it is, that in high mountainous countries, we discover the 

 strongest traces of the original design of nature ; there each or- 

 der of vegetables is confined within narrower bounds; there local 



