64 TEMPERATURE. 



otherwise arid country during the full flowering 

 season, are to be equalled but by few countries. 

 The present season was later than usual, from 

 the coldness of the weather continuing for 

 a more advanced period of the year than had 

 been experienced for many years in New South 

 Wales. On our arrival the thermometer was 

 lower than we had experienced it in 4P south 

 latitude, or when passing the Cape during the 

 winter season. During the remainder of the 

 month of August, the range of the thermometer 

 was min. 45", max. 58°. 



Besides the Banksia* or honeysuckles, the 

 Boronias, Epacris grandiflora, with its elegant 

 pendent blossoms, and two species o{ Kennedia,'\ 

 one bearing red and the other small blue flowers 



* I remarked that the wood of a species of Banksia, (I be- 

 lieve dentata^ which was used for fire- wood, was of a beau- 

 tiful red colour, and when split in a longitudinal direction 

 displayed a curious interlaced appearance ; it had an astrin- 

 gent taste when chewed, staining the saliva of a dark reddish 

 colour, and I think it would be worth trying if a dye would 

 be furnished by it. 



f The Kennedia is called the " woodbine" by some of the 

 shepherds in the colony, who use a decoction of its leaves as 

 a lotion for scabby sheep, and they declare it is a cure for 

 that disease ; but their declarations of the curative properties 

 of the plant is not borne out by the experience of others, 

 who have found it quite useless as a remedy for that disease. 



