354 THE SCOTCH FIR OR PINE. 



of Europe, from the Mediterranean to Norway, 

 varying in elevation from seven hundred to nearly 

 four thousand feet, in favourable situations at- 

 taining a height of a hundred feet or more, with a 

 trunk upwards of four feet in diameter, and 

 dwindling, as it ascends the mountains, to a mere 

 bush. A variety is said to grow at Nootka Sound 

 in North America, and it is found also in Siberia, 

 Kamschatka, Caucasus, and Japan. There are 

 immense forests of it on the table-lands of Russia, 

 and on most of the mountain ranges of Europe, as 

 far south as the Pyrenees. The seeds are some- 

 times carried by the wind from these latter situations 

 to marshy places and peat-bogs ; but here, though 

 the seeds germinate, the trees are always stunted 

 in growth, and soon sicken and die. The finest 

 specimens grow in a dry soil, and it has been re- 

 marked that in native forests the roots run along 

 the surface, and even rise above it ; and the tree 

 seems to derive a great part of its nourishment 

 from the black vegetable mould formed by the 

 decay of its own leaves. The trunk is generally 

 straight, and covered with a scaly bark of a reddish 

 hue. The leaves grow in pairs, sheathed at the 

 base, from two to three inches in length on young 

 trees, but in old trees they are much shorter. They 

 are convex on one side, and nearly flat on the 

 other, so that when pressed together, they form a 

 cylinder ; the edges are minutely notched, and the 

 colour is a light bluish green, especially beneath, 

 or on the convex surface. They remain attached 

 to the tree four years, and, long before this, ex- 

 change the glaucous hue for a dark green. The 

 flowers appear in May and June, the barren ones 

 arranged in whorls around the extremities of the 



