Page:A Voyage to Terra Australis Volume 2.djvu/605

Comparison with other countries.] that there should be but a single species of Fern in the list, though those of the Flora exceed 100, of which 28 species are found likewise in other countries. It is also worthy of notice that of the Submersed Algæ not more than one-sixth of the whole number found occur in the list: while of the Musci and Hepaticæ one-third, and of the Lichenosæ two-thirds of those observed are also natives of Europe.

The proportion of European plants in Terra Australis, though only one-tenth of the whole number observed, appears to be greater than that in the Flora of South Africa. And the vegetation of the Cape of Good Hope, not only in the number of species peculiar to it, but in its general character, as depending on the extensive genera or families of which it is composed, differs almost as widely from that of the northern parts of the same continent, and the south of Europe, as that of the corresponding latitude of Terra Australia does from the Flora of India and of Northern Asia.

Of the proportion of European species in the Flora of South America, which is probably still smaller than that of South Africa, we have very insufficient means of judging: we know, however, from the collections made by Sir Joseph Banks, that at the southern extremity of America, certain European plants, as Phleum alpinum, Alopecurus alpinus, and Botrychium Lunaria exist; and that there is even a considerable resemblance in the general character of the Flora of Terra del Fuego to that of the opposite extremity of America and of the North of Europe.