232 
SCENERY OF SWITZF.Rr.ANJI. 
makes a great difference in the general appearance 
of the valleys of the Reuss and the Ticino. 
In the former we have dark fir forests, gradually 
giving place to beech and oats, then mixed with 
chestnuts and wheat. In the latter we have chestnuts 
and wheat, then vines on wooden trellises supported 
by pillars of Gneiss or Granite, passing more and 
more into the luxuriant vegetation of the south. 
This plan gives ea.sy access to the fruit, and the 
ground is not exhausted as it is when the vines are 
grown on trees. Moreover, the gneiss, though white 
when freshly fractured, rapidly assumes a rich brown 
tint, and weathers into rounded tower-like forms. 
The houses also assume more and more the char- 
acteristic Italian style of architecture, so different 
from that of the Swiss chalets. 
The Canton of Ticino, and indeed the whole 
district south of the Alps from Domo d’Ossola to 
Chiavenna, consists mainly of crystalline rocks, 
generally Gneiss, and more or less steeply inclined, 
being thrown into a number of folds, which, however’ 
require much further study. 
The Secondary rocks have been almost entirely 
removed by denudation,* but their former existence 
cannot be doubted, and remains still exist, though so 
Rolle, JJtntr, z. Ceol. K. d. Schw,,'\„ xxiil. 
