AUSTRALIAN PLANTS. 
, Observations on some Medicinal Products of Australian 
Plants. By Mr. Mune. 
Tue novel and peculiar botany of the great southern conti- 
nent of Australia has not been examined so minutely, with 
reference to the additions that it may make to the materials 
of the healing art, as might, from its importance, be expected. 
Several causes conspire to produce this; of these, one is ge- 
neral, and applies to all newly-discovered countries alike, 
and others arise from the peculiarities of that particular 
country. The vast improvements which were made in che- 
mistry, more especially during the last century, had a natural 
tendency to mineralize the Pharmacopeeia, and to take off 
the attention of inquiring minds from the medical properties 
of vegetables. It is not easy to say how much has been 
oc on the one side or lost on the other; but that there 
as been loss, is certain; and those who wish that the re- 
: sources of all the kingdoms of nature should be equally open to 
man cannot fail to regard, in the most grateful and favorable 
manner, the labours of the Society instituted for the express 
purpose of doing justice to the medical qualities of plants. 
he peculiar causes are to be found partly in the limited 
knowledge that we have of Australia, partly in the disper- 
sion of its vegetables, partly in their uniformity, and partly 
in the ease with which the colonies are supplied with medi- 
cines from the mother country. ‘There is another cause, the 
ignorance of the natives when first visited. It does not ap- 
pear that their medicines extended beyond chewed or 
sprnagen grass, a poultice of mud, or fomentation produced 
y the application of a broiled fish. Of course, they could not 
point out medicinal plants to the European visitors; while 
these have hitherto been too constantly occupied in erecting 
habitations and finding food, for investigating the virtues of 
plants with that patience and nicety which a subject so very 
recondite demands. 
The principal Australian substances which present them- 
selves to the inquiries of the medical botanist, are chiefly 
gums, or resins, of some description or other, and oils. The 
oils are chiefly obtained from the genus Melaleuca, the spe- 
cies of which are very numerous, and some of them are un- 
derstood to yield an oil resembling in its virtues the cajeput 
oil of the south-east of Asia. The gums and resins are 
chiefly obtained from the stem of Xanthorrhaa, and from 
exudations upon the bark of Acacia and Eucalyptus. The 
