168 NOTES OX THR INDIGENOUS PLANTS OP MELBOURNE, 



cells or cavities, containing essential oil, which, with the gum which exudes 

 from their stems, considering their vast number, must render them very 

 valuable. I am informed by my friend. Dr. Mueller, who has recently been 

 appointed Government Botanist, that hardly any of the Eucalypti of this colony 

 agree specifically with those of Van Diemen's Land, but are exactly similar 

 to those of South Australia. The young branches and young cones of Casu- 

 anna qaadrivalvis, when chewed, yield a pleasant acid, extremely useful to 

 persons in search of water. Cattle are also extremely fond of them." The 

 undergrowth is composed of Pteris esculenta, (Tasmadian fern root,) Hihhertia 

 prostrata, and other small shrubs. Speaking of this root, Mr. Backhouse says, 

 "Pigs feed upon this root, where it has been turned up by the plough, and 

 in sandy soils they will themselves turn up the earth in search of it. The 

 aborigines roast it in the ashes, peel oflF its black skin with their teeth, and 

 eat it with their roasted kangaroos, and in the same manner as Europeans 

 eat bread." 



The aquatics I have already found are Potamogeton nutans; P. obtusi folium, 

 (Gramineum of R. Brown;) Myriophyllum variifoVmm, (Hooker j) Glaytonia 

 Ausfralasiea; Damasonium ovalifolium; and a species of Chara. The Glaytonia, 

 which belongs to N. 0. PoHulacece, inferior in beauty to none of our water 

 plants, is found commonly in watery places. I have observed it in the swamp 

 at the Botanic Gardens amidst Myriophyllum, Hydrocotyle, &c., and also in 

 marshy places near the Yarra, where it is more creeping. It grows in tufts, 

 with elongated linear, somewhat spathulate leaves, from two to four inches 

 long, generally alternate; peduncles, flowered; petals, pure white, obovate, four 

 times as long as the calyx. "This plant," says Hooker, f is somewhat succulent, 

 and so delicate, that it is difficult to distinguish the exact structure of the 

 flowers and the fruit. There can I think be no doubt of its being a true 

 Claytonia, very difierent from any hitherto described, and, as far as I can 

 distinguish, the first species that has been detected in Australia, or even in 

 the southern hemisphere. The plant varies much in size, from one to six or 

 eight inches in height, generally growing in rather dense tufts, sometimes more 

 straggling, and then the stems are creeping. The Damasonium, with its 

 large floating leaves, resembling at first sight those of a Potamogeton, but 

 difiering from them in the venation, I have only observed as yet on the 

 Yarra, near the Ferry, but probably it may be found elsewhere in similar 

 situations. Its beautiful white Nymphaea-like flowers, crimson at the base, 

 delighted me so much on first beholding them, that I rushed into the water 

 to secure specimens, regardless of the ducking it occasioned me. 



Of the Graminece I have only observed two species, namely, Agrostis 

 cemula, R. Br.,) and Cinna ovata, (Kunth,) {Agrostis ovata of Brown's Prod. 

 p. 27,) both growing on the banks of the Yarra, the latter near Richmond, 

 but very sparingly; and of Filices, in the same habitats growing side by side, 



* Backhouse's "Visit to Australia," Appendix, 37. 

 t IcoQBS Plantaruni, vol. iii.. Tab. 293. 



