APPENDIX IV, 319 



considered judgments, not to names casually given. Bentham, in the Flora 

 Australiensis, faithfully gives synonyms, or reputed sjTionyms, wherever he 

 knows them : some were overlooked by him. These thoughts are inspired Isy 

 researches in regard to AustraUan Acacias, and I feel that knowledge in regard 

 to some species would have been fuller and clearer if the well-intentioned, but 

 still mistaken suppression of manuscript names had not been carried to the ex- 

 tent it has been. 



Following are the species recorded by Mueller in the above paper, from 

 M'hat is now the Northern Territory, and I deal with his paper in some detail 

 as it is not only the first, but also the most important paper on the genus in the 

 province dealt M'ith. 



1. A. stipulosa, F. v. M. (op. cit., p. 119). 

 Upper Victoria River and Sturt's Creek. 



Bentham (in Mueller's paper) draws attention to the affinities to ^4. 

 deltoidea, A. Cunn. 



2. A. phlehocarpa, F. v. M. (119). 



Seven Emu River, GuH of Carpentaria. This locaUty is near the eastern 

 boundary of the Territory. 



3. A. patens, F. v. M. (120). 



Hooker's and Sturt's Creeks, but since found with a much wider range. 

 Close to A. siculaeformis, A. Cwnre., and Bentham (in Mueller's paper) thought 

 them conspecific, but afterwards changed his opinion. 



A. juncifolia, Benth. (122), was described in Hooker's London Journal of 

 Botany, i, 841 (1842). Following is a translation : — 



" Glabrous, branches terete, phyllodes straight or somewhat spreading, elongate- 

 subulate, terete — somewhat compressed, without nerves or indistinctly one-nerved, sUghtly 

 grooved, without a point or imeinate-mucronate, peduncles sc litary or double, much shorter 

 than the phyllode, heads many- flowered, sepals free, rather broad spathulate. Phyllodes 

 3-6 inches long. Peduncles 2-6 lines long, never it appears, racemose. Flowers of A. 

 pugioniformi-i, but the sepals are broader. Interior of New South Wales, Cunningham, 

 Fraser, Mitchell." 



Then on the edge of the mountain (Mt. Pluto, near 25 degrees south lati- 

 tude, and 147 degrees east longitude, a httle north of the Warrego, Mitchell 

 collected a " Curious new Acacia, resembling a pine tree, but with the stature 

 of a shrub.'" Bentham in Mitchell's " Tropical Australia," p. 342 (1848), 

 described it as A. pinifolia, in words of which the following is a translation, and 

 reduced this to A. juncifolia in B. FL, ii, 339. 



" Glabrous, branches smooth, phyllodes erect and somewhat incurved, long, linear 

 filiform, the ner\-e distinct on both sides, somewhat tetragonouf, shortly pungent-mucron- 

 ate, peduncles solitary and very short, heads many- flowered, sepals spathulate, free or 

 slightly cohering at the base. Very near A . pugioniformis, but the phyUodia are fi-se, six 

 or more inches long, being longer even than in A. calamifoUa. It differs from the latter 

 species in the inflorescence and calyx." 



Then Mueller ( Journ. Linn. Soc, iii., 122, 1859), described, under the name 

 of ^. tenuissima, a new species, in words of which the following is a translation. 



" Glabrous, branches somewhat terete, phyllodes very thin, elongated, tetragonous- 

 filiform, curved-mucronulate, the stipules minute, deltoid and persisting for a long time, 

 peduncles short, sohtary,monooephalous, pods papery , broadly linear, straight, compressed, 

 marginate, without nerves, slightly flexuose at the sutures, shortly stipitate at the base 

 and acute at the apex." 



Bentham referred this to his A. pinifolia, which Mueller had suggested as 

 possible, but he had not a specimen of Bentham's species to compare. 



Mueller's plant is No. 5, and came from near the source of the MacArthur 

 River, but there is no known specimen in Austraha. 



