1334 



A USTRALASIA ILL USTRA TED. 



need this very local plant as an excitant. At the verge of the tropics, on rivulets 

 of the Macdonnell Ranges, suddenly a Fan-palm makes its appearance, exiled, as 

 it were, from its princely co-ordinal companions, yet proudly sustaining a noble altitude. 

 Ferns, in these regions, are of the most scanty occurrence ; and then at wide distances 

 only, if not entirely absent, Chcilanthcs tcnuifolia and C. vcllca being almost the only 



representatives. Many of 

 the native grasses here 

 are exquisitely adapted for 

 the trying climate ; as 

 instances, may be men- 

 tioned the famous Mitchell- 

 Grass (AstreSla), in two 

 species, and the likewise 

 perennial Pappophorum as 

 among the most drought- 

 resisting and best relished 

 of our national desert pro- 

 vender. Among nutritious 

 pasture-grasses of the vast 

 interior, Poa and Dantlwnia 

 furnish largely the extra- 

 tropic species, Eragrostis 

 and Eriachnc, many of the 

 intra-tropical, some grega- 

 rious and very widely dis- 

 tributed. 



Food -plants worth mentioning are, 

 however, extremely limited in number 

 throughout the dry interior region ; and 

 thus the root of a sort of native Scorzo- 

 nera (Microseris Forstcri) is rather pala- 

 table, while the Ouandang-tree (Santalnm 

 acuminatwri) and a Nitraria-bush (hardly 

 distinct from that of the saline steppes 

 of Asia), some Leptomerias and the small 

 Muntry-shrub {Kunzea point/era), yield fruits 

 really relishable, though the last mentioned 

 plants are more frequent at the coast than 

 inland, where also the Mesentbrianthemum 

 cequilaterale more abounds, well deserving 

 AUSTRALIAN TKKKKSTKiAL ORCHIDS. notice for its sweetish somewhat fig-like 



fruit. Chenopodiwn auricoinmn affords 



widely through the interior a really good spinage-plant, with the advantage of being tall 

 and perennial. The fruits of many kinds of Styphclta, always small, are left as undis- 



