q4 HISTORY OF THE MUSEUM. 



The botanical collection was not less impor- 

 tant. The vegetation of New-Holland differs re- 

 markably from that of other parts of the globe : 

 some plants from that region were already 

 known through the English , and by the voyage 

 of M. de la Billardiere , but the number was com- 

 paratively small. In 1804 were received several 

 living shrubs which have been easily multiplied; 

 and a great number of seeds and preserved spe- 

 cies , of w hich three fourths w ere new , and of 

 which several have escaped the learned researches 

 of Mr. Ptobert Brown : some of them have been 

 published in our Annals. It is worthy of remark 

 that the plants of New-Holland, from Port- 

 Jackson to the Straits of Entrecasteaux, do not re- 

 quire t6 be placed in hot-houses, like those of the 

 tropics, but pass the winter in the open air in 

 the southern parts of France, and many of them 

 even in Paris. Thus the metrosideros , the mela- 

 leuca and the leptospermum , which at first ex- 

 cited so much admiration by the beauty of their 

 flowers, have been introduced into our gardens. 

 The magnificent eucalyptus, which is one hun- 

 dred and fifty feet in height and seven or 

 eight in diameter, is also beginning to be propa- 

 gated in the southern departments. The season 

 at which they bloom requires that they should be 

 preserved in the orangery ; but their habits, in 



