ON THE FLOKA OF AUSTRALIA. 



General Remarks. 



The Flora of Australia has been justly regarded as the most remarkable that is known, owing 

 to the number of peculiar forms of vegetation which that continent presents. So numerous iudeed 

 are the peculiarities of this Flora, that it has been considered as differing fundamentally, or in 

 almost all its attributes, from those of other lands; and speculations have been entertained that 

 its origin is either referable to another period of the world's history from that in which the existing 

 plants of other continents have been produced, or to a separate creative effort from that which 

 contemporaneously peopled the rest of the globe with its existing vegetation; whilst others again 

 have supposed that the climate or some other attribute of Australia has exerted an influence on 

 its vegetation, differing both in kind and degree from that of other climates. One of my objects 

 in undertaking a general survey of the Australian Flora, has been to test the value of the facts 

 which have given rise to these speculations, and to determine the extent and comparative value 

 of a different and larger class of facts which are opposed . to them, and which might also give some 

 clue to the origin of the Flora, and thus account for its peculiarities. This I pursued under the 

 impression that it is the same with the study of whole Floras as of single species or their organs, 

 viz. that it is much easier to see peculiarities than to appreciate resemblances, and that important 

 general characters which pervade all the members of a family or Flora, are too often overlooked or 

 undervalued, when associated with more conspicuous differences which enable us to dismember them. 

 The result has proved, as I anticipated, that, the great difficulty being surmounted of collecting all 

 the materials and so classifying them as to allow of their being generalized upon, the peculiarities 

 of the Flox-A, great though they be, are found to be more apparent than real, and to be due to a 

 multitude of specialities affecting the species, and to a certain extent the genera, but not extending 

 to the more important characteristics of the vegetation, which is not fundamentally different from 

 that of other parts of the globe. 



Before proceeding to the discussion of the elements of the Australian Flora, I shall shortly de- 

 scribe its general character, viewed in the double light of a peculiar vegetation and as a part of the 

 existing Flora of the globe. Its chief peculiarities are : — 



That it contains more genera and species peculiar to its own area, and fewer plants belonging to 

 other parts of the world, than any other country of equal extent. About two-fifths of its genera, and 

 upwards of seven-eighths of its species are entirely confined to Australia. 



Many of the plants have a very peculiar habit or physiognomy, giving in some cases a cha- 

 racter to the forest scenery (as Eucalypti, Acacia, Proteacem, Casuarince, Conifer at), or are them- 

 selves of anomalous or grotesque appearance (as Xanthorrhcea, Kingia, Delabechea, Casual- ina, 

 Banksia, Dryandra, etc.). 



A great many of the species have anomalous organs, as the pitchers of Cephalotus, the 

 deciduous bark and remarkable vertical leaves of the Eucalypti, the phyllodia of Acacia, the fleshy 

 peduncle of Exocarpus, the inflorescence and ragged foliage of many Proteacece. 



Many genera and species display singular structural peculiarities, as the ovules of Banks/a, 



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