FEBRUARY 7 i 



greenery of the blackfellow's orange hang the small yellow 

 balls which give it its name. The blueberry ash, which two 

 months ago was white with blossom, is now covered with 

 berries already ripening to the required colour. 



There are still a few flowers in bloom. The white thorn, 

 or Bursaria, is the most noticeable thing in the bush, as it 

 will be for the next few months, and its tiny blossoms hold 

 a nutty fragrance that makes it a very acceptable flower for 

 the house if you don't mind the thorns in this season of 

 scarcity. Then there is one of the geebungs in flower, too, with 

 deep yellow spikes of bloom amongst its bright green 

 needle leaves. Wild parsley, too, rears its creamy white flower 

 heads amongst the green, but except for these, and a pale 

 wattle, and a small mauve weed which grows all along the road- 

 sides, blossoming time is done. 



For it is the time of maturity. Seeds and fruit have taken 

 the place of flowers ; and young trees have put off their infant 

 leaves of red and copper, and have donned their grown-up) 

 gowns of green ; while the trunks of the older trees have shed 

 their last year's sheaths, and emerged in splendid garments of 

 purest cream, or mottled greys and reds and blues. 



The birds, too, have passed the baby age. No longer comes 

 the sweet twittering of mother-talk and baby answerings. The 

 families have long since left their nests, and are travelling round 

 together. Their education is in full swing; the parent birds 

 do not now carry flies and grubs to hungry waiting mouths, for 



