l6 JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY, 



Alicedale, the junction for Port Elizabeth and Grahamstown, is 

 reached, there is a quite new set. Here the blue Plumbago of our green- 

 houses begins. It is grown at the Cape, but only in gardens, and chiefly 

 as hedges, but is not wild there. But from here it grows northwards 

 to the Transkei and perhaps beyond. With the Plumbago, near 

 Alicedale, grows the parent of our scarlet Pelargonium, and the climbing 

 ivy-leaved Pelargonium as well ; this latter extends a long way north, 

 but I have not seen the scarlet elsewhere. On the high rounded hills and 

 downs between Grahamstown and Alicedale the more northern flowers 

 begin — which reach to Natal — and are mixed with some of the Cape 

 bulbs. But the change from the Cape flora would seem to begin here, 

 or about Port Elizabeth, along the coast. 



As I have not followed the coast along the land I cannot judge 

 more exactly as to where the changes of flora take place along the 

 seaboard. But, as far as I can tell from touching at the various ports 

 on sea voyages, the character of the Cape flowers would seem to be 

 preserved more or less as far as Port Elizabeth. At East London it 

 is very different, though of course there are some plants whose dis- 

 tribution is very wide. For instance, I have seen the pretty blue 

 Pentanisia variabilis in Kaffraria, Natal, and British East Africa, 

 near Nairobi, and Gladioli grow from the Cape to Uganda. But, 

 generally speaking, the flora is entirely changed as far east or north- 

 east as East London; where palms and Streliizia Reginae grow. East 

 London is not far north of Cape Town. On the Pondoland coast 

 the vegetation is sub-tropical. Here are Palms, Dracaenas, Streliizia 

 Augusta, Dombeyas, Gardenias, Tecomas (fig. 14), and other flowering 

 shrubs cultivated at Cape Town. The flora and vegetation of Natal are 

 again different, with individual exceptions. And again, those of 

 Portuguese East Africa merge into those of German East Africa ; while 

 at Mombasa there is a complete change. Then, beyond the Athi plains 

 where range the herds of wild animals; when the cooler and higher 

 regions of Nairobi are reached, all is different again — and though 

 species vary, many of the same genera are found on the other side of 

 Lake Victoria Nyanza, even in the much hotter climate of Uganda. 



To take another line, while the inland forests of Portuguese East 

 Africa have some of the plants or tribes of those of the Pondoland 

 coast, the flowers of the country, generally, are not at all the same as 

 those further south ; but their characteristics are to a great extent 

 preserved through Mashonaland and Rhodesia, to the Victoria Falls. 



Bechuanaland is dry, flat, and monotonous. In passing through by 

 train we saw but few flowers, the prettiest being a little yellow Moraea. 



The Orange Free State, Transvaal, and Kaffraria, inland, would 

 seem to share many of the same characteristics, the plains or open 

 country, of course, differing from the rocky and wooded mountains. 



Since writing this I have compared notes with the Herbarium 

 authorities at Kew, and find that their experience of distribution, 

 from specimens received, coincides with the lines I have drawn from 

 personal and open-air observation. 



