The common branched coralline-moss[84] is one of the most useful plants of all the tribe of lichens. It is pretty frequent with us on our heaths, forests, and mountains. The northern regions afford it in abundance; and there it is peculiarly and singularly useful. It is indeed the very support and foundation of all the Lapland œconomy, and without which the inhabitants could not sustain their rein-deer in the winter time. Linnæus tells us[85], that Lapland affords no vegetables in such plenty as this, and other of the lichens. Plains of several miles extent are totally covered over with it, as if with snow; and where no other plant will even take root, this will thrive and be luxuriant. These dreary and inclement wastes, these _terræ damnatæ_, as a foreigner would readily call them; these, are the Lapland fields and fertile pastures. On this lichen the rein-deer, those sources of all their wealth, feed in the winter time, when it is in its most flourishing condition, and no other vegetable is to be had: with this too they will even become fat. The riches of the Laplanders consist in their number of these cattle: they are cloathed with their skins, fed with their flesh, and from their milk they make both butter and cheese. Nature, by the inclemency of their seasons, has almost denied them the cultivation of their earth: they neither sow nor reap; but live a perpetual migratory life, tending their flocks of rein-deer, upon which their whole care is centered and employed. The milk of the rein-deer is very remarkably fat and rich: it tastes indeed like cow’s milk, with which some butter, and a small quantity of fat or suet, has been intimately united. Dr. Haller[86] suspects, that this richness of the milk is owing to the animals feeding upon this moss. Most of the plants of this family are of an astringent quality, which indeed they manifest to the taste. This astringency of their food will doubtless contribute much to that effect. The rein-deer are not the only animals that will feed upon the coralline moss. The Novaccolæ[87] gather vast quantities of it to fodder their oxen with in the winter. They take the opportunity of raking it together in the rainy seasons, when it is tough; for in dry weather it easily crumbles into powder. This they moisten with a little water in the winter season when they use it, and find it excellent fodder. The coralline mosses are subject to great variation: and altho’ there are several really distinct species, yet they run so into one another, that it is no easy matter to fix upon the real specific distinctions, in many instances. Some species are perfectly white; others have the extremities of the branches reddish, some brown, and others almost black. The common coralline moss in Lapland not unfrequently grows to be several inches long, and even a foot high.