THE VICTORIAN NATURALIST. 9 



of the palm trees. A soaking wet day is not an ideal one for 

 sketching out in the open, especially amongst thick foliage. The 

 ground by the side of the creek is very rich, and the jungle 

 dense with matted growth of Clematis, bmilax, and bracken fern, 

 Dicksonias and Alsophilas, These, with young gum trees, prevent 

 us from getting any good view of the palms, and it takes hours 

 of hard work cutting down trees and the undergrowth of scrub 

 before we can get anything like a satisfactory view. All the time 

 it has been pouring in torrents, and we are drenched to the skin ; 

 however, by the united labours of the party we do manage to get 

 a few rough sketches, though the dripping " pioneers " resting 

 from their toils, and the " special artist'' under his "mia-mia" 

 of fern fronds, present rather a pitiable, if not ludicrous sight. 

 Fortunately, there are no living creatures, save cockatoos and 

 lyre-birds, to pay any attention to the strange habits of " field 

 naturalists." 



The Cabbage Palm (Livistona mistralis) is not, of course, 

 by any means rare in certain parts. The curious point about' 

 these particular ones is that they are found only in this one spot, 

 within a short distance of the sea coast, in Victoria, and consider- 

 ably to the south of the region to which they are otherwise 

 confined. Their existence in this part was first made known 

 scientifically by Baron von Mueller, who passed over the Snowy 

 in the early days, before Orbost was thought of, and when the 

 natives were far from friendly. At this time the Macmillans 

 seem to have had an outlying hut on the west bank of the Snowy. 

 How the palms came to occupy this position is a problem which 

 can never be positively settled. Two theories are possible. One 

 is that they are relics of a flora which was once spread widely over 

 Southern Australia in times past, when perhaps the climate Avas 

 warmer than it is now. If this be so, then these palms alone 

 •remain in this particular spot as relics of a flora elsewhere lost. 

 It is very difficult to believe that this is the case, and difficult to 

 understand why they should have been preserved in this particular 

 spot when they were lost in other parts where the conditions as to 

 climate, soil, and vegetation are apparently quite similar, or, at 

 any rate, so similar that the plant would, if it depended upon these 

 conditions, have as much chance of life in the one spot as in the 

 other. A second theory is perhaps better, though it must be, of 

 course, a matter of conjecture. We may suppose that, at some 

 period, the seeds have been brought to this spot from the part 

 of Australia where the palms flourish. Two agents of transmission 

 are possible — one is water, the other is birds. The palms grow 

 by the side of rivers, into which their seeds must often fall, and 

 at times be carried out to sea. Darwin has shown, first, that 

 some seeds can even withstand immersion in salt water for 133 

 days ; and, secondly, that being eaten by birds will not prevent the 



