Sept., 1908 ] THE VICTORIAN NATURALIST. 83 



St. John's Wort, is spreading rapidly. The introduced Dodder, 

 Cuscuta einthymum^ L., seems to be more dangerous, especially 

 to lucerne, than the native Dodders ; while the parasite Cassytha 

 (Lauracese), sometimes mistaken for Dodder, hitherto has con- 

 fined its attacks to native vegetation and left cultivated plants 

 untouched. 



One curious feature of the native flora is the small number of 

 useful economic plants it contains. A few of the forest trees 

 produce good timber, but the latter is usually too hard, 

 heavy, and brittle when seasoned to be of much value, except 

 for special purposes where durability is all-important and little 

 working required ; while the softer woods are, for the most part, 

 not very durable, or are very liable to warp and crack — at least, 

 under the methods of seasoning usually adopted here. There 

 are practically no native fruits and no native cereal grains of any 

 value as food for civilized man. Even the native fodder grasses 

 and fodder plants are, with a few notable exceptions, inferior in 

 quality or objectionable on account of their armed fruits, and are 

 being driven out by more suitable and adaptable introduced 

 grasses. 



All the Leguminosas used as fodder (Clover, Trefoil, Vetch, &c.), 

 are introduced, so that if we exclude the Acacia^ with its wattle- 

 bark, this important order contains no native representatives of pro- 

 nounced economic value. A large number of our native flowers 

 would possibly be capable of great improvement under cultivation, 

 and other native plants might be found to develop useful economic 

 properties under selective treatment. The cultivated plants of 

 the world are mainly the result of selective adaptations from the 

 floras of Europe and Asia, and no one seeing the original wild 

 mustard for the first time could have predicted, without long trial 

 extending over generations, the series of useful cultivated plants 

 (cabbage, cauliflower, rape, mustard, brocoli, Brussels sprouts, 

 turnip, &c.) to which this one genus would give rise. If only 

 such investigations are made before it is too late, although we 

 may regret, on sentimental grounds, the shrinkage of the native 

 flora and the probable ultimate extinction of many of its repre- 

 sentatives, it can only be regarded as the inevitable result of the 

 progress of settlement, while the spread of the different weeds 

 of cultivation is the usual, though by no means an unavoidable, 

 accompaniment of the same change. 



The proper establishment of the National Park at Wilson's 

 Promontory will render it possible to preserve many species 

 which seem in danger of extinction — at least, until such time as 

 their economic possibilities have been thoroughly ascertained ; 

 and it is sincerely to be trusted that none of our endemic species 

 will be suffered to become absolutely extinct when a special 

 harbour and sanctuary exists for them. A species once extinct 



