24 



Australian Plants. 



as well as the bracteolae smooth. Male flowers central 

 pedicellate. Sepals smooth^ the three externals coherent at 

 the base ; the three internals concert in a long tnbe^ the free 

 lobes bearing a gland. Stamens six inserted to the limbus. 

 Anthers bilocular^ introrse. Female flowers marginal on 

 short pedicels^ destitute of a calyx. Style one^ shorty with 

 three filiform stigmata. Capsule smooth^ tricoccous^ loculicide 

 dehiscent. Seeds in the cells solitary^ smooth^ not costulate^ 

 of the structure of Eriocaulon. 



This genus is chiefly characterised by the want of the floral 

 envelope in the female flowers_, but agrees otherwise in habit 

 and structure with Eriocaulon. The name is derived from 

 the colour and shining transparency of the seeds^ not unUke 

 that of amber. 



50. Electrosperma Australasicum. 



On wet places along the Murray, towards the junction of 

 the Murrumbidgee. 



A small annual scapebearing herb. Leaves grass-like, fene- 

 strate-nerved, pellucid. Scape monocephalous, vaginat at the 

 base. 



Art. III. — On the Comparative Value and Durability of the 

 Building Materials in use in Melbourne, By Robert Brough 

 Smyth, 



The selection of building materials has always been a work of 

 difficulty, as indeed is every branch of knowledge, where the 

 experience of a single individual is substituted for those simple 

 principles which arise naturally from an accumulation of facts, 

 ■ — not the records of one life time, but of many, — not of one 

 department of science, but of all. The mistakes that have 

 been made from time to time, as evidenced in the decay of 

 some of the finest architectural works in Europe, have drawn 

 considerable attention to the subject of late years; and that 

 such mistakes may, in a great measure, be provided against, 

 if not wholly prevented, we have the evidence of the Scienti:fic 

 Commission appointed to examine the stone to be used in the 

 New Houses of Parliament, and of the Corps of Royal 

 Engineers, whose sound and practical observations, founded 

 on actual experiments, are worthy of the highest consideration. 



It not only has immediate reference to the conservation of 

 those edifices wherein the genius of the architect is para- 



