49 



the same time. This, though a common, habit amongst 

 plants, is not universal. In c^ses where flowering is sea 

 sonal, the advantage is readily understood ; but where, 

 as in Gum, there appears an indifference, it can only 

 be an advantage in that it enables the masses of their 

 small flowers to be seen far off. Gums depend for cross- 

 fertilisation principally on honey-feeding birds. It is an 

 advantage to the birds that a succession should continue all 

 through the year, and to both that a flowering tree may 

 be picked out in the forest at a great distance. 



These trees seem in no more hurry to disperse their 

 seeds than they are in flowering. Seed is seldom ripe 

 before a year, and generally longer; and when ripe they 

 remain in the capsules sometimes for years, till those 

 bodies are quite dead and dry. Gather old capsules that 

 have been on the boughs for many seasons, and leave them 

 to dry in paper; they will open their valves and let good 

 fertile seed be shaken out. This condition of fruit and 

 seed is of great value to trees growing in countries sub- 

 ject to fire. Any large Gum tree in our forests will be 

 found to have on its branches thousands of capsules in a 

 condition of maturity, but that have never opened to 

 permit the seed to escape. If a fire occurs all the finer 

 portions of the tree are killed, and the ground below is 

 cleared of all undergrowth. The scorched capsules dry 

 and open, and the seed falls on land quite prepared for it. 

 This adaptation to fire conditions is very common in cap- 

 sular Myrtles. Some Pines have the same habit, retain- 

 ing seed in the cones for an indefinite period, until a fire 

 sweeps the forest away, when the resistant, but scorched, 

 cones deliver up their seed to build a forest anew. 



A smooth-barked Eucalypt is readily killed by fire, 

 that is, all that is above ground; but the roots in many 

 instances respond by sending up suckers. In some cases 

 the result of ringing trees is that the land is soon covered 

 with a denser growth of Gum trees than it bore before. 

 But all of them have not this resource, and can only pro- 

 duce shoots at the base of the dead stem, or not at all. 

 The smooth condition of bark is produced by the tree shed- 

 ding its outer bark as soon as dried. Gums do this at no 

 stated period. If a tree is developing girth rapidly the 

 bark is shed at short intervals; while the same species, 

 growing under less favourable conditions, will shed it at 

 longer intervals. Some trees, like Stringy-bark and Black 

 Peppermint, have persistent, thick fibrous bark. This is 

 a great protection against fire. It takes a very severe 



