184 BOTANY OF KING GEOUGE's SOUND. 



are, I tave not collected specimens of them ! — do not cry "shame !" 

 All the Bryandras seem out of flower, and so are SynapJuEce. Irani- 

 landia is very common, sad-coloured, and tolerably scented : I shall 

 try for seeds of it, but it seems little disposed to make them. Lam- 

 lertia ecJiinata is the only one of the genus I have yet met with, and 

 it is nearly out of blossom ; I have gathered a few seeds of it. A 

 few Stylidia remain, but many are withered up. The climate here is 

 very much colder than you would suppose by the latitude. This is 

 the hottest month of the year, yet I have not seen the thermometer 

 above 74° in the house, with open windows, at the hottest part of their 

 hot days] and it is much more frequently 68° or 70°, The sky has 

 been clouded for three out of four days since I have been here. We 

 have had rain three or four times, and several evenings a fire was quite 

 pleasant ; and I sleep under two blankets, and usually a counterpane 

 besides. It almost always blows (often strongly) from ten o'clock in 

 the morning till sundown, and sometimes aU day and night. Westerly 

 and S.W. winds (both cold ones) prevail. I should think most of the 

 plants here ought to bear the open air in Devonshire, or south of Ireland. 

 Tliey say the summers are only six or eight weeks long, and the rest of the 

 year is noted for high winds and abundant rains. At present the plains 

 are tolerably dry, but in winter what is not sand is spongy hog. The 

 summers are scarcely long enough to ripen grapes, and none but very 

 early kinds, such as often ripen out of doors in England, will ripen. 

 A few apples, with Cape gooseberries, are all the fruit I have seen. 

 Pears there are, and figs ; but unless every individual fruit is tied up in 

 a bag, it is eaten up by the cockatoos. Then almost all the pastures 

 are poisoned, so that sheep and cattle cannot be kept at large ; and con- 

 sequently meat is M, per lb. in the market, and not always to be had. 

 Gastrolobium bilobum is the worst of the poison shrubs here, bat almost 

 every district has its own plague, and many of them are Leguminosm ; 

 so that I do not recommend you to emigrate to this settlement. Yet, 

 King George's Sound is very prettily formed,— sloping hills, broad 

 valleys, a perfectly land-locked and capacious harbour, and a wonder- 

 fully beautiful vegetation in the proper season, as I am told and can 

 well believe. I hope my next letter will have more to telL Ask Jo- 

 seph to write to Gunn, saying I hope to be at Launceston in September 

 or October; and let him urge the Port Davy expedition. 



W. H. Hativey. 



