10 THE FLORA OF SOUTH AUSTRALIA. 
the Festuca bilobulata. Then again, we have the lovely Correas aud 
other capital Diosmee, which increase the variety; and we have espe- 
cially to notice a host of other plants, where the stunted Hucalypti, in 
crowded masses, give rise to the gloomy and monotonous character of 
the landscape, which travellers, on account of the immeasurable extent 
and ever-varying height of these dwarf forests, have so aptly desig- 
nated as “a sea of bushes.”- But nowhere is the plant-world of 
Australia so inexhaustible, nowhere in the play of colours and forms 
more full of variety, than in those retired districts, where, too, the 
original flora has been least disturbed by the over-luxuriance of foreign 
intruders. 
In particular districts the country becomes lighter, and on argilla- 
ceous and calcareous soils are seen other moderate-sized Hucalypti, of 
the type of E. odorata, without however being crowded together, like 
that species, in the thickest parts of the sandy soil. Many bushes and 
shrubs moreover vary the physiognomy of this scrub-district, to which 
the viscid Dodoneas and Zygophyllee are peculiar; the splendid Ære- 
mophila alternifolia, and the closely allied species of Stenochilus, with 
their spotted flowers, to which are added high bushes of Hakea and 
leafless Daviesia, here and there overshadowed by the gummiferous 
Pittosporum acacioides, by Myoporum platycarpum, or Sandal-trees. 
The sterile mountain-regions approach, in the character of their 
vegetation, the bush-covered plains. Their noblest representative is 
the stringy-barked Eucalyptus (E. fabrorum), a mighty tree, with 
shining leaves, and stems straight as a line. Casuarina quadrivalvis 
and Banksia australis, the only small trees which are usually associated 
with it, sufficiently indicate a transition to a better soil, while the most 
barren and stony heights are occupied by the palm-stemmed Xan- 
thorrhea quadrangulata, Acacias, Pulteneas, Daviesias, the unapproach- 
able Zsopogons, Platylobium, Tetratheca, Leucopogon, Leptospermum, 
Brunonia, Hakea, Grevillea, Calycothriz, large-flowered Lurybias (which 
we are accustomed to call Olearias), Izodea, Calostemma, Helipterum, 
Stackhousia, Hardenbergia ovata, the species of Pimelea, and so many 
more of the favourites of our gardens, which unite to form a perfect 
parterre, among which the fiery-red Stenantheras and Astrolomas, and 
a host of charming species of Hpaecris, are pre-eminently conspicuous. 
Bursaria spinosa here always bears the aspect of a stunted shrub, 
although in the deep vegetable mould of the eastern districts it 
