BOTANY. 
227 
estimates that in three centuries and a half one hundred species 
may thus have become extinct, and we are now witnessing the disap- 
pearance of the remaining fragment. We have only to see the old 
weatherbeaten veteran Gumwoods on Longwood Plain, grown hoary 
with long white lichen ; the hard struggle of the Scrubwood, 
Mellissia, F rankenia, and Plantago, for existence ; and to learn from 
those who have tried to cultivate the native plants in the Island the 
extreme difficulty in growing them,* to be convinced that they 
were originally surrounded by some other climatic conditions than 
now exist. 
The green vegetation once seen clothing the Island to the water’s 
edge, was doubtless, with some lost species, formed of Ebony, 
Scrubwood, Frankenia, Mellissia, Plantago, Mesembryanthe- 
mum, Pelargonium, Pharnaceum, and Tripteris, these being still 
found to occur on the outer and lower zone of the Island near the 
sea, with perhaps the addition of the Bosemary and Gumwood, 
which occupy an intermediate zone between the outskirts and the 
central highest parts of the Island, where all the rest of the remain- 
ing indigenous plants are now found. This vegetation was probably 
so thick as to prevent the existence of grass ; the absence of which 
is remarkable in the native Flora, one species oidy occurring, and 
that confined to the high land, while exotic grasses freely and fully 
overrun the Island. 
Viewing in the present day the dry, barren, soilless, frowning, 
lichen-coated, rocky outskirts of the Island, it requires strong faith to 
realize its ever having been green with vegetation, were it not that the 
record of such a fact handed down to us is endorsed by the Ebony 
trunks and stems still existing where no vestige of life can now be 
found ; and also by the manuscripts preserved at the Castle, f telling of 
leaving the best of the bark on the branches, by which means has destroyed all those trees, at 
least three for one, and therefore to prevent the like for ye future and to preserve and recover 
so usefull and necessary a thing for the Island use. Ordered — That no more J tides be sold to 
the People, for that We are about to engage one John Orchard, a Tanner, who has offered 
himself to Tan and dress those Hides at 3s. 6d. apiece.” One condition of his agreement 
being that ho would get the bark off the common, the great advantage of which would be the 
preservation of the trees. 
* Notwithstanding the great difficulty in propagating these plants, Dr. Hooker has suc- 
ceeded in the introduction of thirteen of them, in addition to most of the St. Helena ferns, 
mto tire conservatories of the Royal Dardens at Kew. 
t “ Two soldiers being suddenly killed while on duty at the Crane Battery by falling 
r ocks, it was resolved to make a timber covering over the Battery, and for this work 240 
pieces of Gummwood timber, of ten foot long and five inches broad, be cut in the next adjacent 
Q 2 
