368 PLANTS, SEEDS, AND CURRENTS 



In the first-named work the subject is hardly mentioned, whilst 

 in the second it is not alluded to. After he had made his study, 

 he was surprised to find that excellent accounts of the vertical 

 distribution of plants on the mountain are to be found in the writings 

 of Hochstetter (1843), Seubert (1844), and Morelet (1860), and that 

 Drouet (1866) gave many details of importance. However, it is 

 to the Hochstetters that we are most indebted for information on 

 the subject. It was with mingled feelings of satisfaction and dis- 

 appointment that the writer discovered that his main Tesults were 

 in close agreement with those of the German investigators and of 

 their later French fellow- workers in this field. 



In the vertical range of the plants there are few material differences 

 between the writer's results and those of the previous investigators. 

 In the actual arrangement of the zones the differences are also few, 

 and in the main the suggested zones either confirm or amplify the 

 writer's own arrangement. 



The zones on Pico, as first described in the conjoint paper by the 

 elder Hochstetter and Seubert in Wiegmann's Archiv (1843), were as 

 follows : — 



I. The cultivated or Mediterranean zone, extending from the coast 

 to an altitude of 1500 feet and characterised by Mediterranean and 

 European cultivated plants, weeds, and shore plants. 



II. The Canarian zone, or belt of the Laurel woods, extending 

 from 1500 to 2500 feet. 



III. The Azorean zone, or region of shrubs, 2500 to 4500 feet, 

 where many of the species peculiar to the Azores occur. 



IV. The bush or scrub region, 4500 to 5000 feet. 



V. The peak region, above 5000 feet to the summit (7600) feet. 



There are one or two conspicuous defects in this arrangement. 

 In the first place, the Canarian zone extends considerably above 

 2500 feet. Then, any scheme that ignores the vegetation of the 

 upland moors, so prominent a feature on the slopes of the mountain, 

 between 2000 and 4000 feet, would be incomplete. The data, again, 

 scarcely justify our regarding the region between 2500 and 4500 

 feet as characterised principally by shrubs, or as being the special 

 home of peculiar Azorean plants. The coast, the lower woods, 

 and the upland moors, all present some of these endemic plants, 

 which number only about thirty in all, several of them having been 

 not yet recorded from Pico. 



In Seubert's Flora Azorica, published in the following year (1844), 

 zones II. and III. are named respectively, the regions of the lower 

 and the upper mountain woods, a correction which makes the arrange- 

 ment closely similar to the one independently adopted by the present 

 writer, the characteristic plants of each zone being in close correspond- 

 ence. Here again, however, the belt of the upland moors is not 

 recognised. The arrangement, as given by Seubert, is based on 

 Hochstetter' s notes, and is as below given. 



I. Region of cultivation, coast to 1500 feet. 



II. Lower mountain woods, 1500 to 2500 feet. 



