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THE AUSTRALIAN MUSEUM MAGAZINE. 



plants of his island. He had favourite 

 trees, he told me, and often I saw him 

 lay his hand on a slender bole, almost 

 tenderly. His knowledge of i>lant lore 

 was equal to that of many amateur 

 botanists who devote all their leisure 

 to the study. He knew living plants, 

 as he knew living birds and butterflies, 

 and has praised them in perfect prose. 



Dunk Island is a great wild garden. 

 When my friend was busy at some 

 task in which I could not share, I 

 wandered alone to the Valley of 

 Tree-ferns, whence the bungalow's water 

 supply is di-awn by an ingenious system 

 of pumps and pipes. There, deep in 

 shadow and silence, I saw at the hub 

 of its web, a large and beautiful s])ider 

 that was almost a pet. Fairy foliage 

 was all about, and the fringe of silence 

 was stirred by a sleepy murmur of 

 water, sliding over stones below my 

 resting place. 



The trees and shrubs and creepers 

 of the jungle were bewildering in 

 variety, and many were quite strange 

 to me. Beach plants were more fam- 

 iliar. The handsome but nearly branch- 

 less Macaranga tanarius, whose slqnder 

 stems, straight as a rod, were used, 

 long ago, by the natives for fish-spear 

 handles, grew freely in many spots. 



On the big, flat leaves, I searched profit- 

 ably for insects ; one yielded a wonder- 

 ful Brenthid beetle, not hitherto recorded 

 from the isle, and many of the shining 

 green bugs, mistaken at first for rare 

 beetles. 



Dunk Island trees include splendid 

 specimens of Brassaia actinophylla, 

 " unique among the many novelties 

 of the tropical coast," as " The Beach- 

 comber " has said. Close by the boat- 

 shed, they stand in groups, and give 

 unfailing pleasure to a nature lover's 

 eyes. My friend was proud of his 

 umbrella trees, and he loved to tell 

 his visitors their history. I shall quote 

 from Tropic Days, the passage read 

 so often on the isle : — •" Queensland has 

 a monopoly over this handsome and 

 remarkable tree, the genus to which it 

 belongs being limited to a single species 

 occurring nowhere else in a native state. 

 Discovered by Banks and Solander at 

 Cooktown in 1770, the second record 

 of its existence, it is believed, was made 

 from specimens obtained on this island 

 by MacGillivray and Huxley in 1848." 

 And the very trees that the naturalists 

 of the Rattles7iake admired, may be 

 those in my photograph, which pleased 

 '■ The Beachcomber " beyond all others 

 that I obtained in his realm. 



On July 11th, in the presence of the 

 Hon. A. Bruntnell, M.L.A. Minister for 

 Education, and Mr. S. H. Smith, M.A., 

 Under Secretary, Department of Edu- 

 cation, Messrs. J. McGeorge and E. 

 Brandon Cremer presented a cinema 

 film " Astronomers and Aborigines." 

 This depicted doings of the party under 

 the direction of Prof. W.W.Campbell, 

 at Wallal, which observed the total 

 eclipse of the sun at that locality on 

 September 21st, 1922. 



The film clearly showed the diffi- 

 culties which the party had to contend 

 with and overcome, and is well worth 

 seeing by those interested. It is 

 interspersed with pictures showing 

 the life of the aborigines, and this 

 contributes to its general interest. 



During a recent cruise of the Ger- 

 anium in the Gulf of Carpentaria, Dr. 

 W. E. J. Paradice, R.A.N, interested 

 himself in collecting specimens for the 

 Museum and secured a particularly 

 valuable collection of fishes. A number 

 of these have not been previously 

 recognised from Australian waters, and 

 they are clearly related to the estuarine 

 forms of the great rivers of Papua. A 

 considerable quantity of fish was 

 utilised as food by the ship's company, 

 and Dr. Paradice's notes upon them 

 afford valuable data as to their edible 

 quality and abundance. By arrange- 

 ment with Dr. Paradice, duplicates of 

 the fishes will be forwarded to the 

 Queensland Museum. 



