104 _ FOREST CULTURE AND 
more particularly in a young country, to which im- 
migration streams mainly from a colder zone; but 
this display of increased capabilities, and of more 
varied products of a mostly winterless land, may 
entice the inexperienced to new operations without 
guarding him against failures. I should even like to 
see tables of calculations in this Museum, from which 
could be learned the yield and value of any crop with- 
in a defined acreage and from a soil chemically exam- 
ined; but from this I would regard inseparable a close 
calculation of the costs under which each particular 
crop can only be raised. Unfortunately, surprising 
data are often furnished concerning the productive- 
ness of new plants of culture ; but it is as frequently 
forgotten that the large yield is, as a rule, dependent 
on an expenditure commensurately large. — 
Among the most powerful means for fostering phy- 
tologic knowledge for local instructive purposes, that 
of forming collections of the plants themselves remains 
one of the foremost. No school of any great preten- 
sion should be without a local collection of museum 
plants, nor should any mechanics’ institute be without 
such. It serves as a means of reference most faith- 
fully; it need not be a source of expenditure; it 
might be gathered as an object of recreation; it may 
add even to the world’s knowledge. Through the 
transmission of numbered duplicate sets of plants to 
my office the accurate naming may be secured.* From 
such a normal collection in each district the inhabit- 
* Parcels of plants pressed and dried, and afterward closely packed, can 
be inexpensively forwarded by post, and, by the excellence of the Australian 
postal arrangements, can be sent from distant stations of the interior, from 
whence botanical specimens of any kind, for ascertaining the nature and 
range of the species, are most aeceptable ; while full in‘ormation on such 
material will at once be rendered. 
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