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BOTANICAL INFORMATION. 
Botany of Western Australia ; by Mr. James DRUMMOND. 
The following communication, giving some most striking discoveries 
by our indefatigable fellow-colonist Mr. James Drummond, in his 
botanical researches to the south, is addressed to Mr. G. Leake :— 
Dear Sir, —In my last letter I promised to send you some observa- 
tions on the botany of this part of the colony. I have now collected 
three hundred species, principally on the Perongarup and Toolbranup 
hills, and in the vicinity of Cape Riche. I shall confine my obser- 
vations to such plants as are remarkable for beauty, or otherwise 
interesting. To the Leguminose, the most numerous order in Australia, 
I have made many additions. One of the most beautiful plants I have 
seen is, I suppose, a species of Gastrolobium, which I call G. Leake- 
anum : it grows twelve to fifteen feet high, with opposite leaves three 
inches long by two broad, and bears clusters of large deep scarlet 
flowers in the axils of the leaves; it is abundant on Congineerup, near 
the east end of the mountain, growing in all sorts of soil, from the base to 
. the summit. The banks of the Salt River and its tributary streams pro- 
duce a fine species of Brachysema, allied to the B. latifolia of Mr. 
Brown, but with larger leaves, which have longer points; it is an up- 
right growing plant, producing its flowers on the shoots of the pre- 
ceding season ; they are borne on short footstalks, five or six in the 
axils of each leaf; they are large and bright scarlet. The fine foliage 
of this plant, silvery underneath, and the great number of its flowers, 
in which it differs greatly from the other species of the genus, make 
it one of the finest plants of the order to which it belongs. 
I found on Congineerup a remarkable Leguminous shrub, bearing, 
instead of leaves, large glaucous phyllodia, somewhat resembling Acacia 
gamophylla, but having yellow papilionaceous flowers: I could see 
nothing of the old or young seed vessels. The plant is very rare on 
Congineerup, near the east end of the mountain. To Myríacez, and 
particularly to the sub-order Chamelaucia, I have made most important 
additions. A beautiful and apparently nondescript genus near Actino- 
dium, but differing from it in having the outer flowers of the heads 
forming a ray like many composite plants. I gathered two species of 
