PAEEAMATTA DISTEICT. 101 



to perpetuate the knowledge of them. Now, however, that we 

 possess the most extended means of circulating information 

 through tKe press, and of preserving the discoveries of the present 

 age for thq moral elevation and material advancement of those yet 

 to come, it behoves us, whenever we have ascertained that the 

 properties of any particular plant have a tendency to alleviate or 

 remove the ravages of any disease, to place the fact on record. 

 And if persons of observation, residing in different parts of the 

 colony would adopt this course, and not act on the selfish prin- 

 ciple of acquiring knowledge for their sole gratification or advan- 

 tage, we should soon collect a body of facts that would tend 

 materially to advance the science of Medical Botany amongst us, 

 and to render unnecessary the importation of many medicines 

 from abroad. What Pliny said centuries ago, is true now even 

 with us, that simple, natural, and in expensive remedies are always 

 at hand : " Hcec sola naturae placuerat esse remedia, parata vulgo, 

 inventu facilia, ac sine impendio" 



EEMAEKS ON THE 



BOTANY OF BERRIMA, & THE MITTAGONG RANGE, 



WITH 



A GLANCE AT " EEEE SELECTION." 



Read before the Parramatta Church Society, 1864. 



"nUEINGr a short visit to Berrima and the Mittagoug Eange in 

 the beginning of October last, I had a favourable opportunity 

 of examining the vegetable productions of those parts, and of 

 collecting many specimens of plants which I had not previously 

 seen in a living state. The town of Berrima is on the Winge- 

 carribbee Eiver (which is a tributary of the Wollondilly) , and 

 some years since it was a place of some importance ; but owing 

 to the discontinuance of transportation to this colony, and the 

 consequent reductions in the Government establishments, it has 

 become a place of less note. Berrima is rather more that eighty 



