so great
as at present. Will you believe it, hundreds of men are engaged in this
noble and useful calling? Among them may be found representatives of
all the nations of Europe--Germans in greatest number; but there are
Swedes and Russ as well, Danes and Britons, Frenchmen, Spaniards, and
Portuguese, Swiss and Italians. They may be found pursuing their
avocation in every corner of the world--through the sequestered passes
of the Rocky Mountains, upon the pathless prairies, in the deep
barrancas of the Andes, amid the tangled forests of the Amazon and the
Orinoco, on the steppes of Siberia, in the glacier valleys of the
Himalaya--everywhere--everywhere amid wild and savage scenes, where the
untrodden and the unknown invite to fresh discoveries in the world of
vegetation. Wandering on with eager eyes, scanning with scrutiny every
leaf and flower--toiling over hill and dale--climbing the steep cliff--
wading the dank morass or the rapid river--threading his path through
thorny thicket, through "chapparal" and "jungle"--sleeping in the open
air--hungering, thirsting, risking life amidst wild beasts, and wilder
men,--such are a few of the trials that chequer the life of the
plant-hunter.

From what motive, you will ask, do men choose to undergo such hardships
and dangers?

The motives are various. Some are lured on by the pure love of
botanical science; others by a fondness for travel. Still others are
the _employes_ of regal or noble patrons--of high-born botanical
amateurs. Not a few are the emissaries of public gardens and
arboretums; and yet another few--perchance of humbler names and more
limited means, though not less zealous in their well-beloved calling,--
are collectors for the "nursery."

Yes; you will no doubt be astonished to hear that the plain "seedsman"
at the town end, who sells you your roots and bulbs and seedlings, keeps
in his pay a staff of plant-hunters--men of botanical skill, who
traverse the whole globe in search of new plants and flowers, that may
gratify the heart and gladden the eyes of the lovers of floral beauty.

Need I say that the lives of such men are fraught with adventures and
hair-breadth perils? You shall judge for yourself when I have narrated
to you a few chapters from the experience of a young Bavarian
botanist,--Karl Linden--while engaged in a _plant-hunting_ expedition to
the Alps of India--the stupendous mountains of the Himalaya.

CHAPTER TWO.

KARL LINDEN.