AUSTRAL] A. 273 



Bottenest has one fault at this season. There is but one tide 

 in the twenty-four hours, and it so happens that at spring tides 

 (which are the only times the reefs are bare) low water occurs 

 late in the evening, and now, in mid winter, after dark ; so that 

 I lose the best time for exploring the reefs, and am precluded 

 from visiting the more distant ones. The island is well wooded. 

 The most common tree is a cypress (Callitris Preissii), with leaves 

 of a bright cheerful green, a very unusual tint among the 

 sombre-leaved trees of Australia. Two kinds of Acacia form 

 dense shrubberies difficult to walk through. A leguminous 

 shrub called Temphtonia is also very abundant, and just now 

 the gayest plant here, being covered with its large crimson 

 flowers. A hoary shrub called Stenochilus, with flowers not unlike 

 a Salvia, varying from yellow to orange or blood red, is common, 

 and a narrow-leaved Clematis ties the shrubs together in a way 

 rather aggravating to a " traveller," whose "joy" it is not. Of 

 small plants few are yet in blossom, but the ground is thickly 

 covered with young seedling annuals, which in a few months' 

 time must make a gay show, but I shall not see them in their 

 glory. 



I must not forget to mention the persevering spiders which 

 weave their nets from tree tc tree, and bush to bush, across 

 every pathway in the island ; rendering it necessary to keep a 

 stick in constant motion, in order to clear the way before you, 

 unless you would have your face covered, every few minutes, 

 with very stout cobwebs Sometimes I have thought it a pity 

 to destroy such an elaborate net, but you cannot otherwise 

 " get along." 



I am living at the governor's house, part of the old convict 

 establishment now given up. The governor very seldom comes 

 here. My housekeeper is an old woman of respectable class, who 

 is now in her nmety-third year, yet hale and hearty, and who keeps 

 the whole house in the most exquisitely clean state, without any 

 help. You see her on her knees scrubbing the floors, which to 

 my eyes appear so clean you might roll out pastry on them ; 

 then dusting the walls and wiping the doors and windows is an 

 endless job. She makes my bed and lights my fire, bringing in 

 the firewood herself. Her chief trouble is that the people who 

 farm the island steal her eggs and chickens. She is mother to 

 the pilot's wife, Mrs. Back, at whose house, about a hundred yards 



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