240 



Drunamond, writing from Hawthorn den Farm, Toodyay Valley, 25th July, 

 1839, says :— 



I have lately crossed the country from the sea-coast to the district called by the aborigines 

 Guangan. I believe Guangan, in the native language, signifies sand; but I mean by it the open sandy 

 desert which commences at about 80 miles E.N.E. from Freemantle, and is known to continue in the same 

 direction for 200 miles. Hooker's Journ. Bol* ii, 556 (1840). 



the open sandy country is bordered by a considerable forest, composed principally of two 

 kinds of Eucalyptus, called Urac and Morral by the aborigines. The Urac was in full bloom, but it 

 seemed no easy matter to procure specimens, the trunk of the flowering trees being GO feet high, very 

 smooth, and of a yellow colour. . . . One of the most conspicuous plants on Guangan is a shrubby 

 Eucalyptus with large glaucous coriaceous foliage, and conspicuous red flowers, succeeded by large 

 seed-vessels. I have observed a white-flowered variety of the same. (Letter of James Drummond, 25th 

 July, 1839, in Hooker's Journ. Bot. ii, 360, 1840.) This letter contains many references to Guangan. 



The above is evidently the origin of Hooker's statement. I do not know 

 what Urac is for a Eucalypt, but Morral or Morrel is a variety of Eucalyptus oleosa, 

 dealt with in Part XV, page 166. 



Through a slip of the pen, Hooker's statement would lead one to suppose that 

 Morral is a name for E. macrocarpa, which is not what Drummond said. The 

 last paragraph refers to E. macrocarpa. 



As to Guangan, Lehmann (Planta? Preissiana?, i, 132) refers to it as 

 Quangen, province of Victoria. Bentham has the same spelling, " Forest bordering 

 the Quangen Plains." 



Mueller has it in the sentence, "From Dungin Peak eastward through the 

 Guangan Desert (J. Drummond)." Guangan seems to be lost from modern maps 

 but Dungin (Doongin) Peak is a remarkable conical hill, which I visited, a few 

 miles from Tammin on the eastern railway. I suggest that Guangan survives in 

 the modern name of " Wongan Hills." The Guangan district, as referred to by 

 Drummond, is a somewhat irregular area, more or less to the N.E. and E.N.E. of 

 Fremantle. It would probably, on its northern side, touch the old " province " of 

 Victoria, and its most southerly boundary would include Dungin Peak. How far 

 the " Guangan desert " goes eastward from Doongin Peak, as referred to in 

 " Eucalyptographia," I do not know. 



I submitted my identification of Guangan with Wongan, to Mr. Harry F. 

 Johnston, the Surveyor-General of Western Australia, who concurs. He says : 

 "It is the name now given to an isolated range of ironstone hills about 95 miles 

 north-east from Perth." 



He adds : — 



With reference to the "open sandy desert commencing about 80 milts E.N.E. of Fremantle, and 

 known to continue in the same direction for 200 miles," Mr. Drummond has been greatly misled, as 

 though " sand plains " so called exist, and some of large extent, later surveys have long since dispelled 

 erroneous ideas as to the size and sterility, and most of the land so designated is comprised in one of the 

 best wheat districts of the State, and the balance is grazing country for sheep. 



* A word of caution in regard to the various series of Hooker's Journal of Botany may be useful. There are : — ■ 



1. The Journal of Botany, being a second series of the Botanical Miscellany, &c, by W. J. Hooker. Vols, i-iv 

 (1834-1842). The above extract is from this series. 



2. The London Journal of Botany, by W. J. Hooker. Vols, i-vi (1842-1847). 



3. Hooker's Journal of Botany and Kew Garden Miscellany, by Sir W. J. Hooker. Vols, i-ix (1849-1857). 



