On the Weir Mallee, a Water-Yielding Tree. 33 



the contrary some present a vast open space of considerable 

 width. During a recent visit to the Murray, -where I had often 

 heard of this useful shrub, my friend, Mr. Peter Beveridge, 

 rode with me into the Mallee, accompanied by one of his 

 native stockmen, who, on our approaching the edge of one of 

 the plains, at once pointed out the tree. It grows upwards of 

 twenty feet high, and scarcely differs in appearance from those 

 around to the eye of a stranger, but easily to be detected on 

 the brownish tinge of its leaves being pointed out. Our 

 black immediately proceeded to cut a yam stick about five or 

 six feet long, which he pointed with his tomahawk, and then, 

 tracing the roots by a slight crack discernible on the surface 

 of the ground, he dug underneath it till obtaining space 

 enough for the point of his stick, he pushed it under and 

 then prized up the root as far as he could. Going further 

 from the tree he repeated the operation until he had, perhaps, 

 fifteen or twenty feet of the root laid bare. He now broke 

 up the roots into lengths of three to four feet, and, stripping 

 off the bark from the lower end of each piece, he reared them 

 against the tree, leaving their liquid contents to drop into a 

 pannikin. On holding a piece of root horizontally no water 

 is to be seen, but the moment it is placed in an upright 

 position a moisture comes over the peeled part, until the 

 pores fill with water which drops rapidly. 



The natives when travelling in search of water, on finding 

 the tree, usually cut off a large piece of the bark to serve as 

 a dish, which they place at the foot of the tree, leaving the 

 broken roots to drain into it, whilst they smoke a pipe or light 

 a fire. The root, en being broken, presents to view innu- 

 merable minute pores, through which the water exudes most 

 copiously ; from a pint to a quart of pure water being pro- 

 curable from a root of twenty to thirty feet long. Some 

 roots which we carried with us to the home-station, gave out 

 a little moisture the next morning, but the weather being 

 excessively warm, rapid evaporation had no doubt taken 

 place. The water which I now exhibit, is just as it drained 

 from the root, in the month of March last, into a pannikin, 

 the bottle never having yet been opened, and the results of 

 the chemical analysis of the contents of a second bottle will no 

 doubt be laid before us by Dr. Macadam, who kindly took 

 charge of the same, with this view, at our last meeting. 



Mr. Peter Beveridge ascertained that water was procured 

 from the roots of the Beefwood tree, a small tree described 

 by Dr. Mueller, in the 14th volume of Professor De Can- 



D 



