ORDINARY MEETING.* 



Professor Edward Hull, LL.D., F.R.S., in the Chair. 



The Minutes of the last Meeting were read and contiimed, and the 

 following paper was read :■ — 



REMARKS ON JIIE PAST, PRESEM] AND FUTURE 

 OF THE AUSTRALIAN FLORA. By tlie Rev. W. 

 WooLLs, Ph.D., F.L.S. 



THE primeval history of Australian Botany is necessarily 

 associated \vitli the adventurous navigators, who, 

 animated by the spirit of Vasco di Gama, traversed the 

 Indian Ocean and reached the Nortli-western shores of New 

 Holland Avhereof Van Diemen's Land— subsequently called 

 Tasmania, Avas then regarded as an integral portion. Such 

 II mistake may seem strange to the present generation, but 

 it held its ground until the year 171)8, when Bass and 

 Flinders discovered that Van Diemen's Land was separated 

 from the mainland by at least a hundred miles of sea. Portu- 

 guese and Dutch navigators had already become acquainted 

 Avith New Holland in their voyages to the East Indies, but as 

 these A^oA'ages were undertaken in the interests of connnerce 

 and at a period wlien systematic botany Av^as only in its infancy, 

 they added but little to our knoAvledgo of tlie Australian Flora. 

 It Avas not until the days of Dampier, Avho in 1699 visited the 

 Western Coast of Australia for the second time, that any 

 specimens of Australian plants Avere collected and taken to 

 Europe. To Dampier belongs the honour of having been 



* .laniuuv 21st, ISOf). 



