Page:Aspects of nature in different lands and different climates; with scientific elucidations (IA b29329668 0002).pdf/341

 equal; whilst we know that certain well-explored districts in Europe have more than three times as many insects as phænogamous plants     113-119

Considerations on the probable proportion which the number of known phænogamous plants bears to the entire number existing on the surface of the globe     119-125

The different forms of plants successively noticed. Physiognomy of plants treated in a threefold manner; viz. as to the absolute diversity of forms, their local predominance in comparison with the entire number of species in different phænogamous Floras, and their geographical climatic distribution     126-200

Greatest extension in height or of the longitudinal axis in arborescent vegetation: examples of 235 to 245 English feet in Pinus lambertiana and P. douglasii; of 266 English feet in P. strobus; of 298 and 300 English feet in Sequoia gigantea and Pinus trigona. All these examples are from the north-west part of the New Continent. Araucaria excelsa of Norfolk Island only attains, according to well-assured measurements, 203 to 223 English feet; and the Mountain Palm of the Cordilleras, Ceroxylon andicola, 192 English feet     165-168

These gigantic vegetable forms contrasted with the stem of two inches high of a willow-tree stunted by cold of latitude or of mountain elevation; and still more remarkably with a phænogamous plant, Tristicha hypnoides, which, when fully developed in the plains of a tropical country, is only a quarter of an English inch in height     169

Bursting forth of blossoms from the rough bark of the Crescentia cujete, the Gustavia augusta, and the roots of the Cacao tree. The largest flowers, Rafflesia arnoldi, Aristolochia cordata, Mag-*