FOREST SCENEET. 219 



other berries no larger than currants. The Australian 

 cranberry, which is described as growing on a bush ten 

 to fifteen feet high, and the berries of which resemble the 

 Siberian crab, does not grow here. There is a fine fruit 

 peculiar to the "mallee" scrub, of a bright red colour, 

 called the " quontong," about the size of a greengage, 

 which grows on a shrub something like a small shey-oak ; 

 it is bitter to the taste, makes excellent preserves, and 

 the emus eat them greedily. I have tasted a kind of 

 fruit they call the native pear, not half so good to eat as 

 a raw Swedish turnip. "Whatever others may be found in 

 the interior I do not know ; but, as far as regards hand- 

 some or remarkable species, both in botany as well as 

 ornithology, this district must be about the worst in 

 Australia. Melons and pumpkins will grow anywhere, if 

 planted, wild ; and a delicious fruit is the little water- 

 melon in hot weather. 



There is a savage grandeur in the scenery of the 

 Victorian forests, unsoftened by the lighter foliage of 

 those beautiful shrubs which we generally look for in 

 a southern land. The principal features of the woodland 

 landscape here are old gum and huge iron or stringy 

 bark trees, which have braved the storms of centuries, 

 and stand out in bold relief from the deep evergreen of 

 the cherry, the light foliage of the wattle or black- 

 wood trees, and the " mournful weird-like appendages " 

 of the shey-oak. The gullies are choked with shrubs, 

 many of them very beautiful ; but we see little variety 

 among the forest trees ; and we look in vain for the 



