45 
Alps; yielding to none of the tribe in the elevation it 
attains, except to the Pinus uneinata on the Pyrenees, 
and the Pinus cembra on the Alps. 
The testimony of Cmsar goes to disprove its being a 
native of Britain; but its right to be considered such is 
now placed beyond dispute; the reasons for which are 
ingeniously and satisfactorily stated in Whitaker’s History 
of Manchester, but are too long to be quoted at large in 
such a mere sketch as this. 
The same desire of brevity will preclude the enumer¬ 
ation of the various species of this extensive genus : but 
we must single out from the mass the Abies picea, or 
Norway spruce, as it is considered by some as “ the 
great tree of the Alps; ”—“ and so far,” says Sir Thomas 
Dick Lauder, “ as our opinion on its effect in landscape 
may go, we can only say, that with us it is so mentally 
associated with the grandeur of Swiss scenery, that the 
sight of it never fails to touch chords in our bosom 
which awaken the most pleasing recollections . . . What 
can be more truly sublime,” he continues, “ than to 
behold, opposed to the intensely blue ether, the glazed 
white summits of Mont Blanc or the Jungfrau, rising over 
interminable forests of spruce firs, which clothe the bases 
of the mountains ; while some gigantic specimens rise in 
groups among the rocks before us, shivered, maimed, 
