Woo 'ill? a. I : Plant Geography in Switzerland, 171 



lind that the earhest contribution, that by Josias Simler (1633, 

 F. H. 4), deals with alpine plants. 



Seventy years later Scheuchzer (1702-4 and 1706-8, F. H. 

 5), another Swiss who made mam^ excursions in the country, 

 described a number of new species, and speculated on the causes 

 producing the dwarf habit of these plants, attributing it to the 

 diminution of air pressure on the principle of communicating 

 tubes. It was left for Haller (1768, F. H. 9) to give the first 

 sketch of vegetation regions or vertical zones in Switzerland, 

 but he gives no types of altitude. 



In 1S13, Wahlenberg (F. H. 74), a Swede who had travelled 

 in North Switzerland, determined the limits of vegetation, and 

 characterised the leading types. A few years afterwards, 

 Kasthofer (1822 and 1825, F. H. 80), a forester and excellent 

 observer, wrote accounts of excursions in the Swiss Alps, which 

 contain many good observations on forests, their former and 

 present limits, the influence of climate and man on forests, 

 also useful hints on replanting. 



In 183 1, Hegetschweiler (F. H. 74), a man much in advance 

 of his contemporaries, m.ade many experimental cultures on 

 Swiss plants, paying special attention to the effect of environ- 

 ment on plant form. He was one of the first to study the 

 plasticity of plants, and the effect upon them of different con- 

 ditions. 



At this time, Oswald Heer, a young man of twenty-two, who 

 became afterwards professor of botany in the University of 

 Ziirich, was actively at work studying the natural history of 

 Glarus, his native Kanton. In 1836 (F. H. 127) he published 

 an account of the vegetation of the south-eastern portion of 

 Kanton Glarus, describing the results of his observations on 

 climate, soil, and vertical zones of vegetation. He concludes 

 with a list of species in which he characterises in an excellent 

 manner, the particular habitats of the species. It was in this 

 paper that he introduced the term ' Schneethalchen,' those 

 little hollows high up in the Alps where the snow remains long 

 after it has disappeared from the surrounding parts, such areas 

 possessing a strikingly characteristic and interesting flora. 



The example thus set of studying a limited area from an 

 ecological, as well as from a floristic point of view, has since been 

 largely followed in Switzerland. Many of the recent Mono- 

 graphs are modelled upon it, and they furnish favourite themes 

 for inaugural dissertations. Heer took a wide interest in 



1908 May I. 



