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128 of pines, spruces, and firs, and above them a truly alpine region, which has enriched our flora with a long list of choice species. 5. The Pacific coast, with the neighboring mountain ranges, within the influence of the mild atmosphere of the ocean, has a wonderfully varied flora. Among trees, maples, buckeye, cherry, buttonwood, oaks in great number, chestnut, birches, willows, and others of genera common to the northern states of the east, are here represented by species peculiar to the coast. The conifers of this region are among the loftiest; and pines, spruces, firs, cypresses, and arbor-vitæs make up an arboreal vegetation of great variety and interest. Among the trees of genera not found in the other divisions are the madroña, sometimes called strawberry tree, a magnificent broad-leaved evergreen (arbutus Menziesii), and the California laurel or bay (oreodaphne). The genus Torreya, of which there is a species in Florida, is represented here by the “nutmeg tree;” California white cedar, sometimes reaching 140 ft., is a libocedrus; here is the home of the sequoias or redwoods, of which S. gigantea, widely known as the mammoth tree, towering from 300 to 450 ft., is one of the two largest trees of the world. The shrubby growth of this region presents numerous species of eastern genera, and is equally varied. Among herbaceous plants, the range from the coast to the mountain tops is wide, and presents a flora so rich that the labors of botanists have not yet exhausted it. Many of the choice ornaments of our gardens, eschscholtzias, gilias, nemophilas, the mimulus, whitlavia, collomia, lupines, pentstemons, and others, have here their homes; perhaps the most interesting plant of this region is the Darlingtonia, a pitcher plant of curious structure, and, like its eastern relatives the sarracenias, carnivorous. A marked feature of the flora of this region is the wide areas occupied by single species, almost to the exclusion of all others. A great many interesting native grasses are found here. 6. Western Texas, 200 m. from the coast, is a high plateau, and with the lower parts of New Mexico and Arizona forms a region the vegetation of which is more like that of Mexico than of any other part of the United States; it is a region of elevated table lands, cut up by sterile mountain ranges, with but few streams and very little rain. Along the watercourses are found cottonwoods and willows, but the majority of the few trees which occur elsewhere are of the leguminosæ, the most frequent being the mezquite and the related screw bean; these and the tesota or ironwood (Olneya), palo verde or green tree (cercidium and Parkinsonia), cassias, and others, the Mexican pistachio, Spanish buckeye (Ungnadia), mulberry, and a few others, make up the tree growth, except in the mountains, where in favorable localities pines, oaks, &c., occur. The shrubs are numerous, and, in common with other vegetation, abundantly armed with prickles and spines; some shrubs,

such as Kæberlinia and holocantha, rarely show any leaves, the green bark answering their purpose, but have every branch and twig sharpened to form a formidable spine, and the leafy shrubs often have their branches thus terminated, or are furnished with special thorns; a thick growth of these spinescent shrubs is known as “chaparral,” and forms an impenetrable barrier to man and beast. In this division are found agaves, dasylirions, and yuccas, some reaching the stature of a tree. The most characteristic plants of a large part of this region are the cacti, which occur in a great number of species presenting a wide variety of forms and size. Opuntias of the prickly pear style are numerous; some are 6 ft. high, others with cylindrical stems are scarcely bigger than a quill, while the tree-like O. arborescens is as large as an apple tree. Species of the globular mammillarias are not larger than a walnut, while some of the oblong echinocacti are of the size of a barrel; all these are dwarfed by the giant cereus, the candelabra-like stems of which sometimes reach 40 or 50 ft. In some localities almost the whole vegetation is made up of these plants, which present nature in her most grotesque aspect.—Flowerless or cryptogamous plants, especially those of a lower organization, are much less restricted in their distribution than flowering plants. Among the higher orders of these, the ferns and club mosses, many of the genera and also of the species are the same as those of Europe, and in the mosses, lichens, and lower forms the number of European species is still greater; but all these families present a large number of peculiarly American genera, and American species of European genera. Among ferns, the most noticeable of the northern and southern states are the maiden-hair (adiantum), the walking fern (camptosorus), the climbing fern (lygodium), the golden fern (polypodium aureum), and the so-called sensitive fern (onoclea). The smallest of our ferns is schizæa, very local in New Jersey, and one of the most striking is vittaria, an epiphyte in Florida, the fronds of which are more like a tuft of grass than a fern. The Pacific coast, the Rocky mountains, and even the desert region of Arizona, have their peculiar species. In mosses and hepaticas the country is very rich, and in these as well as in lichens the few botanists who devote themselves to their special study are continually adding to the number of known species. The fungi, though but partially investigated, are numerous, with a large number of edible species among them. In algæ the Atlantic coast, while it has many that are common to the shores of Europe, produces its peculiar species of interest; but owing to the sandy character of a great portion of the shores, the marine vegetation is as a whole very meagre. The keys of Florida are rich in species, many of which, as well as those of the gulf of Mexico, are also common to the Mediterranean. On the Pacific coast are found the gigantic