Land, sea and sky, or, Wonders of life and nature : a description of the physical geography and organic life of the earth / translated from the German of Herman J. Klein and Dr.Thomé by J.Minshull.

Hermann Joseph Klein

Date:: [1884]

Credit: Land, sea and sky, or, Wonders of life and nature : a description of the physical geography and organic life of the earth / translated from the German of Herman J. Klein and Dr.Thomé by J.Minshull. Source: Wellcome Collection.

884/932 (page 806)

$fawn-coloured spider, one inch and a half long; ih.Q Latrodecliis, another greatly! dreaded spider; the locust {Cicada plebcJa,orni, etc.), whose chirp is character- istic of the southern summer; and lastly, the leech {Hirndo officinalis), with which the south of Europe, and especially the south-eastern districts, supply nearly all the demand of the markets. The European Forest Region. The north-eastern countries of Europe which are still left for our con- sideration, the region round the mouth of the Petschora, belong to the arctic flora, and the south-eastern to the steppe region. do not treat of these] separately, it is because both the flora and fauna of the comparatively small' territories can scarcely be distinguished from those of the Asiatic districts of* the arctic regions which have been already described ; and even the forest region may be dismissed in fewer words, so as not to be compelled to clothe in new phrases facts already generally known. In our description of the artic flora of North America, we called the^ attention of our readers to the influence of the Gulf Stream upon the climate! of Europe;.but the genial influence of the Atlantic Ocean, as Dove has shewn,; is felt throughout the whole of Europe, as far as the Ural Mountains; the floral of the Asiatic forest region being accordingly much less luxuriant than that of| the European. The most perfect expression of the sea climate is found in the beech {Fagus sylvatica), which excels in this respect all other forest trees by which the physiognomy of the landscape is determined. During its period of vegetation, which lasts for five months, it needs, together with a sufficient quantity of moisture, a temperature never falling below 50°, and therefore its northern boundary, running from the north-west to the south-east, begins in the southern boundaries'of Norway (lat. 59°), and traverses Europe almost in a straight line across Calmar (lat. 57° on the east coast of Sweden) and Königs- berg, as far as Padolia, to continue its advance beyond the steppes, through the districts belonging to the Mediterranean region in the Crimea and the Caucasus. Farther northward penetrates the oak {Qiierciis pediincidatd), whose limits deviate but slightly from the line which connects together places of an average yearly temperature of from 36*3° to 38°, and passes near Christiansund (on the coast of Norway, lat. 63°), across to Petersburg (lat. 60°) and Perm (lat. 58°), as far as the Ural chain, which it does not overstep. Then comes the zone of the conifers, which in European Russia occupy the wide space to the boundary of tree growth, and extend beyond the Ural, through the whole of Siberia, as far as the Amoor and the coast of the Sea of Okhotsk. Of these three climatic zones of the European forest region, the zones of the beech, oak, and pine, the first is again subdivided into three sections, which may be designated by the chief characteristic tree of each one as the zones of the evergreen shrubs, the silver fir {Abies pectinata), and the bitter oak {Querciis cerris). The zone of the evergreen shrubs comprises the northern boundary of Spain, the greatest part of France, Great Britain, the Netherlands, the coast districts of Germany, as far as the Oder, Denmark, and the south of Scandinavia, as far as the beech can thrive. The zone of the silver fir includes Dauphine in France, Switzerland, the greater part of Germany, Poland, Gallicia, and the Austrian half of the Austro-Hungarian kingdom. The zone of the bitter oak, lastly, is composed of the Hungarian half of the last-mentioned kingdom, together with the countries extending to$