THE EXTRAORDINARY "BLACK-BOY^' 159 



of the like kind he has seen in the eastern and southern 

 portions of the continent. Casuarinas, which in other 

 districts are fine trees, are here usually very poor specimens 

 of the genus — dwarfed and sickly looking. On the other 

 hand, some characteristic plants of the west here attain their 

 maximum degree of development. This is notably the 

 case with the grass-tree {Kingia australis), which in the 

 Swan River district is one of the most notable objects in 

 the landscape. About Fremantle, in particular, there are 

 remarkably fine specimens of this curious plant, some of 

 which attain a height of seventeen or eighteen feet, though 

 the tree does not usually grow more than ten or twelve 

 feet high. 



It is a plant, shrub, or tree (I know not which to call it) 

 of exceedingly slow growth. The colonists say that it 

 takes forty years to grow a foot in height. I do not know 

 if this is an exaggeration, but I can state that plants which 

 are known to be at least a hundred years old are not six 

 feet high. 



The shrub, at first, breaks through the soil, which is a 

 mixture of sand and loam, or a kind of clay, as a round 

 mass of tangled grass of coarse texture, resembling in 

 outward appearance some huge fungus bursting forth from 

 the ground. Very slowly, taking years in the performance 

 of the operation, it rises above the earth, showing a thick 

 black stem which is generally quite straight, but sometimes, 

 with age, becomes rough, gnarled, and convoluted. 

 Gradually the stem increases in height, and the tuft of 

 grass-like filaments spread out and hang in a festoon over 

 the crown of the tree. Then from the centre of this crown 

 there springs a long black stick which stands upright, six, 

 seven, or more feet, according to the size of the tree. 

 Viewed from a distance the plant looks like a bushy-headed 

 native holding his spear upright, hence the colonists call 

 the tree the black-boy. There was formerly a dense forest 

 of these trees along the coast near Fremantle. There are 

 still many of the finest trees left, and the road to Rockingham 

 is lined with them for a distance of several miles. 



The wood of the grass-tree is solid, hard, and full of 



