Page:The Botany of the Antarctic Voyage.djvu/24

2 those few novel forms that appear only in the most arctic parts of America. Even between the floras of Lord Auckland's and Campbell's Islands a marked difference exists, several species growing most abundantly in the latter which are not found at all in the former, where also the proportion of species common to other Antarctic countries is less, and the affinity is greater with the productions of New Zealand.

Lord Auckland's Group.—A view of this small and very limited group, of about twenty miles long and eleven in its greatest breadth, as it appears on approaching from the sea, presents an almost equal distribution of wood, shrubs, and pasture-land. The mountains are low and undulating, nowhere exceeding 1400 or 1500 feet, clothed for their greater part, but scarcely to the very summits, with long grass, and frequently covered during November and December, though not generally, with snow. The climate is rainy and very stormy, so that on the windward sides the plants are stunted and checked, and resemble those of a higher southern latitude, or of an elevation several hundred feet above that which the same species inhabit on the sheltered parts. The whole group of islands appears formed of volcanic rocks, mostly of black trap, whose decomposition, especially among the ranker vegetation of the lower grounds, produces a deep rich soil. A Myrtaceous tree (Metrosideros umbellata) forms the larger proportion of the wood near the sea, and intermixed with it grow an arborescent species of Dracophyllum, several Coprosmas, Veronicas (frutescent), and a Panax. Under these, and particularly close to the sea-beach, many Ferns abound; conspicuous among them is a species with caulescent or subarborescent stems half a foot and upwards in diameter, crowned with handsome spreading tufts of fronds. Beyond the wooded region, some of the same plants, in a dwarf state, mingled with others, compose a shrubby broad belt, which ascends the hill to an elevation of 800 or 900 feet, gradually opening out into grassy slopes, and succeeded by the alpine vegetation. It is especially towards the summits of these hills that the most striking plants are found, vying in brightness of colour with the Arctic Flora, and unrivalled in beauty by those of any other Antarctic country. Such are the species of Gentian, and a Veronica with flowers of the intensest blue, several magnificent Compositæ, a Ranunculus, a Phyllachne, and a Liliaceous plant whose dense spikes of golden flowers are often so abundant as to attract the eye from a considerable distance. Here too the vegetable types of other Antarctic lands may be seen in the greatest number, and even such as are analogous to the Arctic productions, none of which can be more decided than a species of Hierochloe, Potentilla, Cardamine, Juncus, Drosera, Plantago, Epilobium, several Grasses, and Mosses belonging to the genera Andræa, Conostomum and Bartramia. Many of the plants in the lower grounds are no less striking and beautiful, as an arborescent Veronica bearing a profusion of white blossoms, a maritime Gentian, a handsome large-flowered Myosotis, the magnificent Aralia polaris (Hombr. and Jacq.), two fine kinds of Anisotome, and several beautiful Ferns.