REPORT OF THE VICTORIAN GOVERNMENT BOTANIST. 187 
base of the ridges and along the Yarra banks might be widened into 
pleasure drives, could now be readily carried out, the Yarra flats, by 
recent arrangements, being no longer occupied as pasture ground. 
In special artistic ornamentation as yet little has been effected, the 
Director deeming it of pre-eminent importance to devote his early 
means to the raising of trees and utilitarian plants, such as will miti- 
gate the heat of our summer clime, and increase the salubrity of the 
city, or such as will play an important element hereafter in our rural 
economy, and originate new industries. This is the reason why no 
fountains exist, save one in the central island of the lake ; ; thus neither 
are statues erected. 
` Works of art we can call forth at pleasure, while time lost in form- 
ing the plantations caunot be regained. Now, however, since the 
main planting operations have been effected, it is but too desirable 
that a few appropriate statues and monumental works should add to 
the embellishment of the very varied vegetation, and stand with it in 
bold or beautifying contrast. It is proposed to gather works of art, 
constructed of the most varied material; the Carrara marble, all the 
cement compositions, the various blendings of ore, might all be brought 
together for illustration. For the play of fountains, the water pressure 
was hitherto quite insufficient, inasmuch as the Yan Yean works are 
only utilized when, at late night-hours, the pressure exceeds 40 lbs. to 
the square inch. Had not, providently, each of the many garden build- 
ings been supplied with a spacious cistern, it would have been impos- 
sible to save the plantations from destruction during the trials of the 
summer months, unless by costly means Yarra water had been forced 
to the culmination of the hill for extensive irrigation. A special vote, 
adequate for such water works, has never been at my disposal, nor could 
such independent water-supply have been maintained, unless annually 
à considerable outlay for fuel and attendance to an engine were in- 
curred, or, what appears still less desirable, a windmill—apt to inter- 
fere with the traffic, and never sightly—had been established on the 
summit of the ridge. Nevertheless, it might be highly instructive to 
show, by local experiment, ses much Yarra water could be forced by 
Steam-power to the summits of our rises, within certain expenditure of 
capital and labour, because the fertility of many extensive tracts of the 
country could be very much increased, and the clime vastly be 
ameliorated, if rivers like the Yarra, and still more so those of the 
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