THE EUCALYPTUS GLOBULUS. 
387 
paid to it till within the last few years ; and in a glass house 
belonging to the Botanical Museum of Paris, so late as 1854, a 
specimen was exhibited under a wrong name. In Tasmania, on 
the contrary, its divers uses and economic properties were early 
appreciated ; but the real history of the Eucalyptus dates from 
the foundation of the colony of Victoria, about a generation 
and a half ago. The learned director of the Melbourne Bo- 
tanical Gardens, Baron Muller, German by birth, Anglo- Australian 
by naturalization, whose name will ever be associated with that of 
the Eucalyptus, first set to work on the noble task of propaga- 
tion, finding in M. Bamel, a French merchant, an equally zealous 
devotee to the same cause; and it is mainly owing to their con- 
joint efforts in the first instance that this anti-febrile tree, par 
excellence , is now spread far and wide. M. Bamel happened to 
visit Australia on business, and noticed in the public gardens of 
Melbourne a conspicuous young tree, of which he knew neither 
the name nor the family. 44 But,” he writes, 44 1 was struck by 
its elegance, and it became straightway an object of interest to 
me.” He carried some seeds back to France with him, which 
were at once planted, and the extraordinarily rapid growth of 
the seedlings excited no little curiosity. In some cases they shot 
upwards at the rate of a yard in a few months, while their grace- 
ful bluish-green foliage made them agreeable additions to public 
gardens. M. Bamel, a man of business and no botanist to begin 
with, addicted himself to the Eucalyptus with an ardour only 
seen in scientific research. He studied it under all its aspects, 
and predicted the grand part it was to play in the economic 
history of the natural world. As one of his friends has written, 
he believed in the Eucalyptus as optimists believe in the final 
triumph of good over evil upon earth. In imagination he saw 
the plains and marshes of Algeria covered with plantations and 
forests, fever and malaria disappearing, climate and soil under- 
going wondrous transformations, happy populations flourishing 
where fever, pestilence, and ill-rewarded toil had hitherto deci- 
mated the pioneers of civilization. And, fantastical as those 
dreams seemed to others then, they have in great part come 
true, as this history will show. Baron Muller and M. Bamel 
put their shoulders to the wheel, and from 1862 the planting 
of the Eucalyptus was vigorously carried on in various places, 
notably in Algeria. At first saplings were transplanted from 
the Jardin d’Acclimatation, but it was soon discovered that 
seed-sowing offered the quickest and surest means of propagation. 
Seeds, therefore, were sent by Baron Muller in great quantities ; 
and M. Bamel found active coadjutors in MM. Trottier, Cordier, 
Bodichon, and other leading colonists. The name of the dis- 
tinguished botanist Durando will ever be associated also with this 
good work in the colony. These gentlemen soon convinced 
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