10 Description of the Landes of Acquitania. 
sea of water. Their still and unfrequented recesses, are haunted 
by birds and animals that avoid the broad glare of day-light ; and 
the wanderer, when he penetrates into their shady labyrinths, is 
imperceptibly influenced by the gloomy silence around him. Heaths 
seldom or never adorn these forests, where the Ulex and Arbutus 
spring forth in great luxuriance; and the decomposition of the 
leaves and remnants of the pines, gradually forms a soil in which 
shrubby oak trees soon make their appearance. The Pinus sylves- 
tris, (P. syrtica, Thore,) forms the mass of the Pignadas, attaining 
commonly a height of from 80 to 100 feet. A variety with cones 
of about the size of a pigeon’s egg, grows in the Pignadas of Bou- 
cau. The Pinus genevensis, (Duhamel, No. 5,) indigenous to 
Russia and Sweden, was introduced about thirty years ago, and 
has succeeded completely ; the Pinus pinea grows in the vicinity 
of rural habitations ; and the Weymouth pine, (Pinus strobus, ) 
silver fir, (Pinus picea,) P. cembra, P. abies, and the larch, are all 
met with in the enclosures of the Landes. The caks, which in 
most of these forests are mere shrubs, attaining their maximum of 
growth in many parts of the Landes, are the Quercus robur, Q. 
ilex, Q. nigra, and the Q. suber, of which extensive plantations are 
preserved for commercial purposes. The Arbutus unedo, always 
diminutive in the gardens, where it seldom flowers, attains a height 
of 15 to 20 feet in the pine forests, where it is constantly covered 
with fruit and flowers. The cold of 1789, which made the ther- 
mometer descend to —15°, destroyed almost all the plants; the 
largest had at that period 20 to 25 inches in circumference, and | 
about 30 feet in height, but the following spring they in the most 
part sprung out again from the roots. The shade of the Robinia 
seudo-acacia is found favourable to vegetation in the neighbour- 
hood of these forests. The Ilex aquifolium lives sometimes to a 
very great age; one in the vicinity of St. Julien is from 25 to 30 
feet in height, and from 2 to 3 feet in circumference. Among the 
_ other plants common to the Pignadas, are the Tilia europza, Cis- 
tus alyssoides, Var. a., C. salvifolius, (Pignada ef Cape Breton,) 
Crategus torminalis, Thalictrum minus, Melampyrum sylvaticum, 
Anemone hortensis, A. nemorosa, Helleborus viridis, Clematis Vi- 
talba, Geum urbanum, Tormentilla erecta, Cucubalus bacciferus, 
‘C. Behen, Asphodelus ramosus, Convallaria majalis, Sambucus ni- 
gra, S. Ebulus, Asclepias Vincetoxicum, Vinca major, V. minor, 
Vitis Labrusca, Evonymus europeus, Rhamnus Frangula, R. ca- 
thartica, Lysimachia nemorum, L. vulgaris, L. nummularia, Se- 
necio sylvaticus, Aster Tripolium, (groves near Dax, ) Bryonia alba, 
Juniperus communis, Ruscus aculeatus. 
Between the Pignadas and the Downs, are the low bottoms of 
vales and vallies formed by the hills of sand, whose motions pre- 
vent the recess of water, constituting sometimes mere marshes co- 
vered with woed, at other times lakes or ponds, (lagunz,) whose 
borders are shaded by extensive groves; among the trees compos- 
ing these, we observed the Fagus sylvatica, F. Castanea, Carpinus 
Betulus, Corylus Avellana, Ulmus campestris, U. carpinifolia, and 
