26 TROPIC DAYS 



"leaf-stalks dilated into the form of a blade and usually 

 with vertical edges, as in Australian acacias." If one 

 of these wattles is burnt to the ground, but yet retains 

 sufficient life to enable it to shoot from the charred 

 stem, the new growth will be of pinnate leaves, shortly 

 to be abandoned for the substitutes, which are of a 

 form which checks transpiration and fits the plant to 

 survive in specially dry localities. Several of the 

 species thus equipped to withstand drought are ex- 

 tremely robust in districts where the rainfall is prolific. 

 There are no data available to support the theory that 

 such species in a wet district are more vigorous and 

 attain larger dimensions than representatives in drier 

 and hotter localities. In her distribution of the Austra- 

 lian national flower. Nature seems to be "careless of the 

 t^^pe," or rather regardless in respect of conditions of 

 climate. 



Human beings, and occasionally animals lower in the 

 scale, deviate distressingly in their conduct from the 

 general. Plants, too, though lacking the organ of 

 brain, are subject to aberrations of foliage almost as 

 fantastical as the mental bent which in man is displayed 

 by the sticking of straws in the hair. "Phyllomania" 

 is the recognised term for this waywardness. One of 

 the trees of this locality, the raroo {Careya australis), 

 seems singularly prone to the infirmity, for without 

 apparent cause it abandons habitual ways and clothes 

 its trunk and branches with huge rosettes of small, 

 slight, and ineffective leaves, evidence, probably, of 

 vital degeneration. 



Among the beautiful trees of this Island there is one, 

 Pithecolobium pruinosmn, possessing features of attrac- 

 tion during successive phases of growth. The young 

 branches, foliage, and inflorescence, are coated with 

 minute silky hair, as if dusted with bronze of golden 





