Literary Notice. 217 



A Catalogue of Plants, S^c, sold hy Samuel Appleby, Florist, Nurseryman, Land- 

 scape and Ornamental Gardener, Sfc. 12mo, pp. 12. Doncaster, 1840. 

 A very useful little catalogue for the amateur, which may be sent anywhere, 



prepaid, for \d. 



Art. III. Literary Notice. 



Journey from Sydney to the Australian Alps, undertaken in the months of Ja- 

 nuary, Februar}', and March, 1834 : being an Account of the Geographical 

 and Natural Relations of the Country traversed, its Aborigines, &c. ; together 

 with some general Information on the State of the Colony of New South 

 Wales. By John Lhotsky, M.D., late of the Civil Service of Van Diemen's 

 Land, F.R. Bot. Soc. of Bavaria, &c. 



, This will form an 8vo volume of from 25 to 30 sheets. Of these the first 

 118 pages were published in Sydney, but the edition being very small, only a 

 few copies reached Europe. The following are some of the opinions of the 

 press upon it, as well as on the general researches of the traveller : — 



" The newest and best accounts of the interior of New Holland we are 

 indebted for to John Lhotsky, a colonist who, from January to March 1834, 

 travelled through the Australian Alps. He wandered through the interior of 

 the country in a botanical and geological point of view," &c. {Conversation 

 Lexicon.) 



" The general course of the Murrumbidgee is towards W.S.W., so that it 

 would go in the Gulf of St. Vincent ; but Mitchell has laid down its embou- 

 ehwre a degree more east, under the 30° b' of latitude. More accurate accounts 

 about the course of the Murrumbidgee have been communicated subsequently 

 by John Lhotsky. Its inundations are considerable, exceeding its ordinary 

 bed by about 1 200 feet," &c. {Ibid.) 



" Besides the fidelity of the doctor's tour, there is a calm unostentatious 

 naivete running through his narrative, evincing a free and independent mind : 

 there is no conceit, nor affectation, nor weakness, but plain truth and matter- 

 of-fact." {Sydney Monitor.) 



The traveller's botanical exertions have been acknowledged in the following 

 passage : — Lhotskya [ericoides]. Dixi in honorem cl. Lhotsky, M.D,, botanici 

 in Nova HoUandia peregrinatoris," {Prof. Lindley's Natural System of Botany y 

 2d edit.) 



MISCELLANEOUS INTELLIGENCE. 



Art. I. General Notices. 



Soil and Vegetation supplied by Nature -with Sea Salt. — The question, 

 whetlier salt is beneficial as a manure, is one that does not appear to have 

 been satisfactorily settled. The following observations are not directly appli- 

 cable to it, but are offered in confirmation of a fact often stated, that the 

 counties of England exposed to south-western gales, when these gales are 

 violent and accompanied with rain, receive a portion of salt from the sea, and 

 are benefited or otherwise, as the case may be, by the salt deposited on the 

 land or vegetables.- Having a window with a southern aspect, sheltered by 

 a veranda, so that the rain never falls directly upon it, during violent south- 

 western gales with rain, the glass is covered with spray, which, on drying, 

 leaves a film upon the glass ; on applying the tongue, this is found to be dis- 

 tinctly salt. After the gale of the 2 1st of January last, being desirous of 

 ascertaining the fact more clearly, the film was taken off with a sponge, and 

 having washed the sponge and evaporated the water, salt remained in crystals, 



1840. April. a 



