August, 1932 
The Queensland Naturalist 
35 
and his daughter, Mrs. Litchfield, did much of the proof- 
reading of his works. 
Perhaps it is, therefore, not too rash to infer that 
other of the botanists of that day about whose private 
lives we know little were assisted at home in a similar 
manner. 
To come nearer home in time and place I have always 
felt that E. J. Ban field owed much of the succes of Ids 
“ Beachcomber ” life on Dunk Island to his wife. It would 
hardly have been so happy had she not been an extremely 
adaptable woman, and one cannot help feeling that she 
must have been a little lonely. 
But this is all speculation. Coming to actual fact, I 
have found no very early reference to definite botanical 
work being carried out by a woman in Australia (they 
probably had much too much else to do). Here and there 
plants are called after noble ladies, such as Princess Marie 
von Metternich (Mariana ) , Mary, Duchess of Beaufort 
( Beaufortia ), and Prances, Countess of Hardenberg 
( II ar derib erg ia ) , but one feels that this was more likely to 
have been a tribute to their exalted position and an ac- 
knowledgment of patronage than a recognition of botanical 
interest. 
To pass to women who have really produced work of 
their own. There was a Miss Drake whose name is men- 
tioned in connection with Drakea , a genus of orchids. In 
several works the note is added that she contributed 
botanical drawings to the “Botanical Register, ” and this 
one fact is repeated without amplification all through such 
works as I have examined. Very tantalising! Perhaps 
with unlimited time and the Mitchell Library at one’s 
disposal, something more might be discovered. Lindley, 
who called Drakea after her, died in 1865, so she must 
have done her drawing earlier than this. 
Of the earlier Australian women botanists a little 
more is usually known, and it is surprising that Mr. 
Maiden mentions no woman in his list of the earlier 
botanists of Western Australia, because that botanists’ 
paradise offers such exceptional opportunities to the 
botanical artist. 
Tn South Australia there was published in 1861 a book 
called “Wild Flowers of S.A.” by Miss F. E. de Molle; 
it contained 20 plates in colour by the author. As the 
three-colour process was not at that time invented, these 
plates may have been printed in black and white and 
coloured by hand in water-colour. 
