36 
The Queensland Naturalist August, 1932 
In a paper read before the Field Naturalists’ Club of 
Victoria by Mr. Maiden, mention is made of three women, 
a Mrs. Barker of Cape Schank, who collected sea-weeds 
and other algae; a Mrs. Captain Mallard, who collected 
many interesting algae during a short visit to Port Philip; 
and Fanny Anne Charsley, the daughter of a Melbourne 
solicitor who in 1867 published in London in a large quarto 
edition, containing 13 coloured lithograph plates, which 
she called “The Wild Flowers Around Melbourne.” 
The collection of algae seems to have been fashionable 
in the mid-nineteenth century, for we find that a Mrs, 
Charlotte Smith, also a Mrs. May Smith (nee Ballantine), 
both collected algae — the latter was also one of the early 
collectors of Tasmanian flora. 
Another Tasmanian of note is Mrs. Louisa Anne 
Meredith, who came to Tasmania with her husband at the 
age of about 30. She published several large illustrated 
works round about 1860, dealing with her life in the bush, 
and in 1891 a second series of “Bush Friends in Tas- 
mania.” T have seen a copy of the latter publication, and 
though it was easy to recognise many typical Australian 
plants, they seemed to have suffered as it were, a sort of 
translation into an English mode of expression. The stiff 
and erect Banksias, for example, were rendered with 
bends and curves reminiscent of the twisting eglantine. 
(The same effect, by the way, is to be observed in the 
11 Flora Australasian,’’ Sweet, London, 1825.) 
About the same period Mrs. Caroline Calvert, nee 
Atl vinson, in N.S.W. was collecting botanical specimens, 
including several new species; writing and illustrating 
country tales and sketches, and writing notes on the 
botany of the Ilawkesbury district. She was an expert 
taxidermist and an excellent botanical artist, A lady of 
parts, this, and as she was known to her friends by the 
pretty name of Dianella, we can take it that she was charm 
ing as well as clever. 
Of the extraordinary life of Amalie Dietrich, the 
peasant girl of Saxony, who became a well-known botanical 
and zoological collector, it is impossible to convey much 
in a few words. Having married a botanist of the name 
of Dietrich, who treated her very badly, she was forced to 
fend for herself and her little daughter, and turned the 
knowledge of botany she had gained from her husband to 
such good account, that she was finally commissioned by 
the Museum Godeffrov in Hambourg to collect for that 
institution in Australia, mainly in Queensland. Mr. 
Maiden refers to her as “this admirable collector.” 
