X. PREFACE. 
reprehensible practice of fitting botanical names on to vernacular 
ones has never been attempted by the author. He has reason, 
however, to suspect that this has been done in some lists of 
economic plants he has quoted. 
The literature of Australian economic vegetable products may 
be said to date from the great Exhibition of 1851. But until the 
last few years, owing to the somewhat unsettled nomenclature of 
Australian plants, the properties of the same plant will be often 
found described under a variety of botanical names. In order to 
make these old books of reference conveniently available to 
readers, the author has found it necessary to give the synonomy of 
all plants referred to. The nomenclature adopted is that of the 
Flora Australiensis of Bentham and Mueller. All references 
to that work are denoted by ‘‘ B.Fl.’ But the species-names have 
been invariably compared with the Census of Australian Plants 
of Baron Mueller (Part i. “‘ Vasculares,”’ printed for the Victorian 
Government, 1882, and with annual supplements). The references 
to that work are indicated by ‘“ Muell. Cens.” Where no such 
reference is made, it denotes that the species named in the Flora 
Australiensis and the Census are identical. But in those cases 
in which the Cezsus species-name differs from that in the F/ora, 
a note to that effect is invariably given. In some cases the Census 
is the only authority quoted ; in these instances the species has 
not been described in the F/ora. In the case of some new species, 
the names are to be found in neither of these works, for these, 
suitable references are given. 
The use of the learned Baron’s Census side by side with the 
flora Australiensis, became an absolute necessity for the following 
reasons. The earlier volumes of the //ora were published over 
twenty-five years ago, and during that period a large number of 
species have been added (almost entirely by Baron Mueller himself), 
the localities of plants have been confirmed or rectified, and 
greatly extended, and the two learned botanists have not always been 
unanimous as to the botanical limitation of genera and species. 
Further, additional information has shown that some of the names 
(especially in the earlier volumes) of the //ora required amending. 
The Census is, in part, an enlarged index, and supplement to the 
