70 THE JOURNAL OF BOTANY 



It is certain, too, that more might be done by correspondence 

 than is done at present, and we at the National Herbarium are, as I 

 think Mr. Maiden knows, always ready and willing to do our best 

 to help him and his fellow-workers. For example, Mr. Maiden in 

 his Flora of Norfolk Island (Proo. Linn. Soc. N. S. W. xxviii. 692- 

 785) gives an account of Ferdinand Bauer (p. 778) entirely derived 



from the account by Lhotsky in Lond. Journ. Bot. ii. 106-113 

 (1843). Mr. Maiden makes no reference to the large collection of 

 his drawings of Australian plants presented by the Admiralty to 

 the British Museum in that year, and says that he does not know 

 what became of Francis Bauer's collections. Yet a reference to so 



easily accessible a work as the Biographical Index of British Botanists 

 would have shown him that drawings of both workers are in the 

 Department of Botany, and a letter would at once have secured 

 further information about these. Under Streblorrhiza (1. c. 703) 

 Mr. Maiden says that Bauer's drawing is " at the British Museum 

 or Vienna'' — it is not at the Museum — showing that he knew of the 

 Museum collection, although he does not mention it when speaking 

 of the artist ; nor does he say, although this, too, he might readily 

 have ascertained, that the drawings of plants and animals pur- 

 chased by Robert Brown now form part of the British Museum 

 collections. A list of Ferdinand Bauer's Australian drawings at 

 the Museum will be published shortly in this Journal. 



But, although the Brown and Solander descriptions can scarcely 

 be regarded as " historical documents of the deepest interest to 

 Australians, 1 ' there are other manuscripts in the Department of 

 Botany which fairly deserve to be so considered. Thus we have 

 accounts by George Caley of various journeys undertaken by him in 

 1801-6, with descriptions of plants of "the Colony" (New South 

 Wales) and letters to Bunks. We have also the Journal of Allan 

 Cunningham for 1817-1821, with lists of plants obtained, and notes 

 on plants collected on the banks of Brisbane River in the winter 

 and spring of 1829 and in Norfolk Island in the winter of 1830; 

 this Journal was extensively used by Robert Heward in his biography 

 of Cunningham in Hooker's Journal of Botany iv. 231-320 and 

 London Journal of Botan;/ i. 107-128, 263-292 : with the same 

 Journal is a copy of the list of plants collected by Charles Fraser 

 for Earl Bathurst in 1817. The reference to the volumes of draw- 

 ings by Thomas Watling (Journ. Bot. 1902, 302) has doubtless 

 been noted by Australian naturalists. A volume of MS. reports on 

 Norfolk Island for 1840-43, given to Robert Brown by Captain 

 Alexander Maconochie, Lieutenant-Governor of the island, is also 

 in the Department of Botany. 



It may perhaps be possible for Mr. Maiden to arrange with his 

 Government for a transcription of these MSS. or some of them. 1 

 am quite at one with him in thinking that the observations they 

 contain " can only be fully interpreted and appreciated by Austra- 

 lians"; and I am sure that the British Museum authorities will 

 give every facility for their consultation or transcription. 



James Britten. 



