FROM TEMPLE BAY TO HEAD OF JARDINE 585 



which were tied up suffered from nothing worse than starvation, 

 the former must have eaten some POISONOUS HERB. 

 We reached Camp 51 at dusk. (CAMP 54.) 



NOTE. The region described in this and the preceding chapter is a portion of what 

 is now known to many travellers as "THE WET DESERT." It is far from being a "desert" 

 in the sense of being destitute of vegetation, but some of its vegetation is poisonous, 

 and very little of it is fit for the support of horses or cattle. Kennedy (1848) and the 

 Brothers Jardine (1865) had traversed part of it before the geological and prospecting 

 parties (1880). Bradford, in his exploration (1883) preliminary to the construction 

 of the Cape York telegraph line, saw more of it and lost more by it than any of the 

 previous travellers, and his description (see Chapter LXXXVIII) may be regarded as 

 the fullest extant. The drawbacks of the " desert " have been considerably lessened 

 since the construction of the line, as the Telegraph Staff are now familiar with the 

 location of open country and grassy oases. 



The Kennedy expedition, while Carron was with it, barely touched the region 

 of the so-called " heath " which is the dominant feature of the vegetation of 

 the Cape York Peninsula north of the Pascoe River. Otherwise, probably Carron, 

 who was the botanist of the party as well as its chronicler, would have identified the 

 noxious bush. On Kennedy's " forlorn hope," his and Jackey-Jackey's route lay 

 mainly through the " heath," which doubtless told on the horses and contributed to 

 the disaster. Later, the Brothers Jardine found the term " heath " a sufficiently 

 descriptive working name. I followed their example, but carried specimens meant 

 for submission to the then Government Botanist, F. M. BAILEY. These, however, 

 had to be jettisoned because of the growing weakness of our horses. The bush, new 

 to me, left the impression of being more like the European wallflower than anything 

 I had seen before. 



From a recent correspondence with MR. C. T. WHITE, Government Botanist 

 of Queensland, and especially from his letters of nth June and 5th July, 1920, it 

 appears almost certain that the so-called " heath " is Gastrolobium grandiftorum, 

 Bentham, popularly known as " heart-leaf poison bush." In Plants refuted Poisonous 

 and Injurious to Stock," by F. M. Bailey and P. R. Gordon (Govt. Printer, Brisbane, 

 1887), the bush is thus described : "Flowers . . . resembling the flower of the garden 

 wallflower. . . . This dangerous shrub is met with in North Queensland (inland) 

 and North Australia. Others of the genus constitute the most dangerous poison- 

 bushes of Western Australia." R. L. J. 



n 16 



