304 Katice respecting the 



species collected in the course of the expedition, and the 

 science oi' natural history has gained in the same propor- 

 tion. 'It is our duty to present here a short view of these 

 acquisitions, in order to give to government and men of 

 science some idea of the advantages arising from an under- 

 taking which had been considered unfavourable, and in 

 order that we mav pay those laborious men who surmounted 

 so manv obstacles for the purpose of collcctiiig these scat- 

 tered objects, that tribute of esteem and gratitude which is 

 owing to them by the nation. 



Itwill not appear astonishing tliat,in researches confined 

 to coasts for the most part desert or ciivcrcd with woods, 

 which presented neither high mountains nor ravines wheru 

 the diflerent strata could be observed, or w here mines could 

 be du"g, the mineralogists Pusth and iSaillv should be able 

 to collect onlv a small number of minerals, insufficient to 

 give ail accurate idea of the gcologv of the country. What 

 thev brought home will .serve at anv rate to convey a general 

 notion of the surface of the districts which they visited, and 

 to indicate the distinction of the epochs at which the mi- 

 neral sulistances found in them were produced. 



In botany, numerous collections, formed with great care, 

 of live and dried plants, seeds and fruits, and of specimens 

 of wood, were begun by fxiedle and Sautier, and continued 

 by (luiehenot, who alone remained behind them. Lesche- 

 Haut rendered important services by collecting, describing, 

 and delineating himself more than fiOO species which he 

 believes to be new, and of which several mav constitute new 

 gem;ra, .and perhaps orders. I'hemost im[wrtant researches 

 ^vcrc made on the south-v. est coast of New Holland, and 

 in touching at Nuyt's Land, Lewin's Land, Endracht and 

 Kdel's Land, retjions for the most part never visited by the 

 English. Seeds carefully collected by the botanist and gar- 

 dener, which were sown at Malmaison, in the garden of 

 the nuiseum at Montpellier, and other parts in the south 

 of France, and most of which have been raised, afford hopes 

 that some productions of that part of the world may be na- 

 turalized in France. We shall mention here the flax of 

 New Zealand, which unites the brilliancy of silk to the 

 .strength of hemp ; the casiioiina wood and the xijlomelum, 

 superior for cabinet-work to many of those kinds now em- 

 ployed; the English cedar ; the ci/cali/pl/is, which risCs to 

 the iieight of l jo feet, has a trunk 2-1 feet m diameter, and 

 which prf)duces an odoriferous resin that mav become h 

 very valuable medicine. All these new plants, which have 

 germinated in our climate, when habituated to it may in- 



denujify 



