ABIES EXCELSA. 
7 
Oikney and Shetland. The bearing of this fact on the past geography and geological history of Europe 
is stated as follows by Mr Andrew Murray (“ Geographical Distribution of Mammals ”) 
Iceland, Greenland, and Spitzbergen, all three, possess nearly the same flora, and that flora European; they must either have been united 
to each other and to Europe in one line, or united by different necks of land to the Continent; which latter supposition, although not impossible, 
is inconsistent with the close similarity of the floras of these lands, with the configuration of the bed of the neighbouring sea, and with 
other fafts having a like bearing. 
The European character of the plants and inserts of Greenland, Iceland, and Spitzbergen is sufficient evidence that they must 
have been connected with Europe in some way, but that alone throws but little light on the point of connexion. It may have been by 
Norway, by Nova Zembla, or by Britain. The following considerations shew that it must have been by the latter:— 
“No tree now grows in Orkney or Shetland; the only ligneous things that do grow are the Betula albcc and the common Juniper, 
both merely existing as shrubs; but at 6 feet beneath a peat-bog, trees, tranches, leaves, and cones, ascribed to the Silver Fir, have been 
found one tree in particular, of 6 feet in circumference and 40 feet in height, being recorded by Mr Edmonston as having been found 
in peat in Shetland. 
“ When did these trees grow, and what was the climate of Britain then ? Was it really milder then than now, as we should be 
inclined to expebfc, from the fabl of these trees being found in Shetland, where they will not now grow ? As to the date of their growth 
there, there can be very little doubt that it was subsequent to the glacial epoch. The grinding of the ice of that time would sweep 
away every trace of peat-bogs from the surface of the land. Were a Swiss glacier to meet a peat-bog in its course, it would soon plough 
it up, and scarify the ground to the very bone below. It is plain, therefore, that the tree must have grown and died, and the peat 
been deposited subsequent to the glacial epoch. 
“Now, one of two things must have taken place since it grew: either the general climate of the northern hemisphere must have 
undergone a change, and that change must have been from warmer to colder; or the individual climate of Shetland must have done so by 
an alteration in its configuration and physical condition. 
“ But the growth of these Firs (if Silver Firs they be and not Spruces) could not be due to any material change in the general climate 
of the whole country; for their remains are found in the peat, in company with those of the Scotch Pine and Spruce Fir, and as these are 
the same trees that now grow in the corresponding isothermal line on the Continent, no general alteration from warmer to colder can 
well have taken place over the whole hemisphere; and as it is only on the Continent, or in lands not exposed to the sea, that they thrive 
in that latitude, it may be inferred that at the time they grew there, the Shetlands were either not islands, or not such small islands. 
“ But the Shetland Islands rise nearly precipitously from a wide submarine plain seventy-four fathoms deep, which extends from 
these islands to within no great distance of the coast of Norway. Their form, therefore, shews that any increase on their size could only 
be obtained by such an elevation as would unite them to the Continent, from Denmark southwards; and there is little doubt that that 
must have been the position of matters when the trees in question grew on these islands. Along the west coast of Norway a deep 
channel extends in continuation of that of the Baltic. That sea then must have trended away up by the west coast of Norway, and 
Britain must have been joined on to the present Continent from the Shetlands to the north of Denmark, all south of a line drawn 
between them being much less than seventy-four fathoms in depth. The Rhine and the Elbe, so soon as by the subsequent rise of 
the land they came into existence, probably emptied themselves into the Baltic. 
But leaving the past, let us turn to the present and see what is the distribution of the species at the 
present day. Beginning with the north, we find that the polar limit of the Spruce Fir in Western Russia is 
68° 15', and in Norway 67°. In the latter, Dr Schubeler, in his “ Synopsis of the Vegetable Products of 
Norway,” at the Exhibition of 1862, says that between lat. 63° and 65° it grows almost down to the sea. 
Forests of this tree appear up to lat. 66~°, but never beyond lat. 67°. Excluding the still more northern 
form, which we describe separately under the name of A. medioxema, the limit for the Spruce in Norway 
may be placed as follows: in the southern distrids, at an altitude of 2800 to 3100 feet; under lat. 62°, at 
about 2600 to 2800 feet; under lat. 64°, at about 1600 to 1800 feet; and in Nordland, at barely 800 feet 
above the sea. In Sweden it extends a little more to the north, being found in Swedish Lapland, 
according to De Buch and Ch. Martins, as far north as the latitude above mentioned (68° 15' north lat.) 
It is said to advance still more to the north in Russian Lapland towards Enare, according to M. 
C. A. Meyer (“ Carte Geogr. Bot. en Russe ”). 
Southwards from the above extreme northern limits of the species it extends towards the Baltic, 
increasing in abundance until it reaches that sea : it and Pinus sylvestris forming the most extensive forests 
in the south-eastern parts of Norway. 
It does not occur as a native in the west of Germany: thus, it is not to be found in the floras of 
Mecklenburg, of Denmark (Muller, “Flora Fridrichsdalina” and “Fries Summa Veg”), of Berlin 
(Kunth), or of Brandenburg (Ruthe). It begins in isolated individuals upon the shores of the Baltic, 
d in 
