200 A CONTBIBUTION TO, ETC. 



more varied stock of them,. The plants best known as salt 

 bushes are Rhagodia parabolica and JR. hastata, and it has been 

 found by experiment that the leaves of them contain as much as 

 a twentieth part of salt. On these and some allied species, sheep 

 and cattle delight to feed, and they are not only kept in the 

 best condition by such plants, but they are prevented from the 

 pernicious habit of licking clay, which eventually is highly pre- 

 judicial to them. In the passage from Wentworth to Perry, 

 the following species were collected : Atriplex mummulariana, 

 A. spongiosa, Kochia sedjfolia, K. brachyptera, and K. lanosa, but 

 it is probable that other species might have been found a little 

 further from the river, as Mr. Gr. Suttor forwarded to me some 

 time since from his station a little higher up, specimens of A. 

 reniformis, A. inflctta, K. Brownii K. brevifolia, and Rliagodia 

 parabolica. In Sir Thomas Mitchell's " Three Expeditions into the 

 interior of Australia," that writer mentions two new species of 

 the order {Atriplex Halimoides and Scletolcena bicornis), but in 

 his " Tropical Australia," he refers to fourteen different species, 

 and dwells particularly on the vast importance of such plants to 

 the well being of sheep and cattle in the interior. I have re- 

 ceived specimens of salt bushes from the Castlereagh and the 

 Macquarie similar to many of those enumerated, and not very 

 long since, eight species from one station, several of which espe- 

 cially Atriplex leptocarpa, A. prostrata, Enchylcena tomentosa and 

 Kentropsis cornuta, differ from those collected during the expedi- 

 tion up the Darling. ^Notwithstanding the unfavourable state of 

 the weather for the growth of grasses, Mrs. Forde collected 

 sixteen species of the order, some of which were growing over 

 the dry beds of the extensive lakes near the river, and forming a 

 luxuriant hay crop. Of this kind, Sporobolus pallidus, Panicum 

 flavidum, Chloris Mooreei and Stipa flavescens were particularly 

 noticed, as well as a doubtful Poa ; but the grasses generally 

 most nutritious, and distributed most widely on the stations were 

 Anthistiria ciliata (a kangaroo grass), Bromus Australis (an oat 

 grass), and Panicum decompositum (the umbrella grass). These, 

 in ordinary seasons, afford excellent pasture, and one of them 

 (JBromui) has been cultivated in Europe, and much admired for 

 its nutritious properties. The other species collected were Poa 

 Australis, P. ramigera, P. elegans, Stipa clegantissima, Agrostis 



