152 Hardy, The Mallee : Ouyen to Pinnaroo. [vo^xxx. 



flora occurred owing to the presence or absence of kopi. One 

 small plain grew only *' Dillon-bush" — a low, small, 

 and succulent-leaved shrub of salty taste and allied to 

 Zygophyllum. This was recently identified for me at the 

 National Herbarium as Nitraria Schoberi, L. 



Northerly, then, through gently undulating but mostly flat 

 country of savannah type, we drove along an old and faint 

 wheel-track which was often lost, and recovered by scouting 

 horsemen temporarily attached to the party ; the team 

 twisting, doubling, and dodging ; ourselves alert to seize over- 

 hanging branches and ward off danger ; crashing through 

 debris, loosening an iron step here, breaking a strap there ; 

 halting now and again to disengage a snag that had locked the 

 wheels. The conspicuous flowering plants were composites — 

 Helichrysums chiefly, and of these H. luciduni seemed most 

 abundant. Occasionally a little salt-flat was crossed, and I 

 have noted that Nitraria Schoberi was associated with Sali- 

 cornia australis and the introduced Sonchus oleraceus. Some- 

 times the Mallee clumps and scattered bushes were inter- 

 spersed with heathy undergrowth, little of which was in bloom, 

 and at times with grass-land. 



A few miles before reaching Wymlet we arrived at *' Log- tank," 

 which comprises an iron trough, bucket, and wire rope, and, 

 as the name of the place suggests, a sunken pit of rectangular 

 section hned and partly screened from the sun with pine logs. 

 When poured into the trough the water smelt offensively, and 

 produced bubbles that lingered on the surface. I was assured 

 that this was due only to sulphuretted hydrogen and COg, and 

 that the water was good ; in witness whereof some of the 

 horses and some of the men drank of it. The others sniffed, 

 and anticipated the better water at Wymlet. Had we been 

 really thirsty we would not have been so dainty, for this 

 log-tank and trough, and others of its kind, are veritable Hfe- 

 saving agencies in this waterless district. 



At Wymlet (the nucleus of which is an excavated shallow 

 water-hole or tank, of large area, and the environment mallee 

 scrub) we camped for the night, sleeping on the ground, with 

 saddles for pillows. The horses, when liberated, fed on the 

 tall cane-grass which grew, 6 feet high, in the adjacent 

 crab-hole. This grass is Glyceria ramigera (to be called 

 Bamboo-grass), and for robustness, straight growth, and fodder 

 value reminds one of the equally tall Glyceria {Poa) dives, the 

 " wild oats " of the Gippsland mountain forests. These are 

 excelled in length only by that pest of the mountain scrubs, 

 Ehrharta juncea, the well-known Wire-grass. I was told that 

 G. ramigera attains a height of 15 feet in very favourable 

 locaUties. Hereabout the mallee is of three species — viz.. 



