BY JOSEPH LAUTERER, M.D. 57 



In opposition to solitary plants in exceptional corners, there 

 are many cosraopolitic genera and species which are not bound 

 to lakes, rivers, or high mountains, but have found their home 

 everywhere. They belong mostly to the lower classes of the 

 vegetable kingdom. Ferns like the Adder's-tongue {Ophioglossum 

 vulgamm), the bracken (Pteris aquiliyia and longifolia), the maiden- 

 hair (Adumtum capiUus Veneris, A. formostim), the shield-fern 

 [Aspi'linin aculeatitm) and the spleen-root {AspU'nmmtricho))ia7ies) 

 are found all over the world, and the same holds good for many 

 other plants like the club-mosses [Li/copodiuin SthKjo, L. 

 clavatum), the woodrush [Luzida campestris), the self-heal 

 (PruneUa vidr/aris), the brook-weed (^Samnlus valerandi), the 

 Jersey cud-weed (^GnajdiaJimu luteo-allnun), the purple salicaria 

 [Lytlirum salicaria), the agrimony {Agrimonia Eupatoi-ium) and 

 the silver- wheel {Potentilla anserina). 



Of our Australian plants, I found everywhere, with the 

 exception of Europe, the following species : — The white man- 

 grove {Avicennia o(ficinalis) along the coasts, L'ocos nucifera (the 

 cocoa-nut palm), Psilotum triquetriim (allied to club mosses), 

 Cassia rnimosoides (a small senna), Phaseolus truxillensjs (a bean), 

 Centipeda orbicularis (a composite), and Zoryiia diplujlla (a small 

 yellow flowered leguminous herb), which I met on the Andes 

 and which I had previously seen in the Belmont scrub, near 

 Brisbane. Along the Panama Canal I was greeted by the 

 familiar face of the pretty blue flower of Comwehjna ci/anea, 

 which grows in our yards here, but occurs only in Australia and 

 America. The climbing laurel [Cassytha filiformis) , which covers 

 whole trees in the bush, while it occurs nowhere else in 

 Australia except in Queensland, is found all over Asia, Africa 

 and America. The same holds good for Cissampelos Pereira, a 

 small Menispermaceous medicinal plant. 



The farmers sow grain and vegetables all over the world, and 

 according to Scripture, the devil sows the weeds. Some of them 

 are true cosmopolites and have been in the places before grain was 

 introduced. So Hibiscus trionum, belonging to the troublesome 

 family Malvaceae, as well as Malvastrum, tricuspidatwn and Sida 

 rhombifolia, spinosa and cordifolia. I hated these plants in 

 Brisbane, but greeted them like old acquaintances in the barren 

 fields of the Mexican plateau. 



Eragrostis pilosa, a beautiful little grass occupying the 

 spaces between the pavement stones in Europe, has also a cosmo- 

 politic range. In Queensland it is scarcely recognizable ; it 



