INTRODUCTION. 



Through the liberality of the Victorian Government it became possible, to prepare in" 

 the Phytologic Department of Melbourne successively several volumes, illustrative of 

 some portions of the Australian Flora. Thus in earlier years appeared a series of 

 lithograms in elucidation mainly of orders and genera of Victorian plants ; in later 

 years an almost complete iconography of the Eucalypts of Australia became elaborated, 

 and this was followed quite recently by an Atlas of Myoporinous plants. In a desire 

 of continuing these pictorial issues it was deemed best, to devote the next volume to 

 those native species of Acacia, of which hitherto no drawings had appeared anywhere. 

 As the genus Acacia is by far the largest in the Flora of this part of the globe, 

 numbering more than 300 well-marked specific forms, hardly one-third of them hitherto 

 illustrated anywhere, much difficulty was experienced by horticulturists and artisans, 

 here as well as abroad, to identify with systematic accuracy any particular kinds of these 

 plants, either cultivated for ornamental purposes or drawn into use for technic objects, 

 so that a work like the present one seemed specially called for. Moreover it appeared 

 likely, that by offering additional means for naming any of the numerous Acacias of 

 ours now known, they might become restored in European Conservatories to that 

 favor, which they enjoyed so much in the earlier part of this century, when they were 

 largely reared as the first harbingers of the spring, and were the objects of much 

 admiration and delight for the profuseness of their flowering or for the oddity of their 

 fantastic foliage. Since then various of the arborescent Acacias of Australia have 

 attracted forestral attention very widely also in countries with mild climes on account 

 of the celerity of their growth, or the technic importance of their wood, or the great 

 value of their bark for the tanning industry, or the copious yield of mimosa-gum, 

 so that this vast genus of plants is now surrounded by a multifarious practical interest, 

 alien to it when but comparatively few of the species were known and the significance 

 of many for technology remained unascertained. Indeed it may be readily foreseen, that 

 through a publication, such as the present one, various branches of applied workmanship, 

 including that of the seeds-trade, will become promoted or benefited. 



The material for the drawings of these pages has here gradually accumulated through 

 almost forty years, as partly resulting from my own travels and researches, as partly 



