7 
which sandhills contain many cool springs and lakes, which will hold 
water much better than the fabulous stories told of pituri. 
There is one beautiful lagoon, with two smaller ones, just about 
the South Australian border, on dr about the 23rd parallel of latitude, 
which — the blacks averring that it had never before been visited by 
white men, or “ Pirri-birri,” as they call them here — I took the 
liberty of naming “ Pituria lagoons.” The water in these lagoons is 
beautifully clear and soft, and when full they will last nearly, if not 
quite, two years. Pituri grows on the sandhills round them. Should 
the Government wish to make a pituri reserve, here is the place for 
it. The country in the vicinity is of no use for pastoral purposes, so 
a reserve of about twenty miles square, or 400 square miles, would be 
a cheap concession. 
The blacks break off the pituri boughs and tie them up in netting 
till dry ; then when thoroughly dry they break the leaves up and 
enclose them in closely netted bags in the shape of a crescent. These 
are easily carried for the purpose of barter, which is carried on as far 
as Cooper’s Creek and the Barcoo. Before chewing they burn the 
leaves of a shrub they call “ montera,” and moistening the ashes mix 
and chew. I have not noticed any abnormal result from the habit, 
though I have heard that a black unaccustomed to the weed becomes 
intoxicated thereby. I have some young plants in a box, which, if 
they grow, I shall endeavour to bring down, but, as they have a 
journey of 1,000 miles before them overland, the result is more than 
problematical, even should they elect to grow in the box. I am 
rearing one plant, which seems to be growing well, in my garden at 
the station. The seeds, however, may grow, and to facilitate 
selection of a proper soil I shall bring down a sample of mother sand 
for analysis. The suckers grow from long rough roots, which run 
about under the sand and throw up shoots as they go. 
I have to thank Mr. Brown for some ounces of carefully 
dried Pituri in flower, from which the drawing herewith was 
made. The seeds did not germinate, though cared for most 
diligently : they were probably immature. The berries of the 
Pituri bush most likely fall off directly they ripen, as I find to 
be the case with D. my op oroides. 
Mr. Wiltshire kindly forwarded me the following on Pituri 
and smoking : — 
For many years I have by hearsay been acquainted with the 
properties of pituri. In South Australia, in the neighbourhood of 
Lake Hope, the natives procure it from other natives making their 
annual visit South for the red ochre so valued by them. On ques- 
tioning the visiting natives, who have all the marks of long travel, as 
to where pituri grows, I found them wonderfully reticent, the only 
answer I received being an indication by a motion of the hand in a 
Northerly direction and a rattling noise made in the throat intended 
to signify that it was a long way from there. It is much sought after 
by the natives, who will give anything they possess for it — not for 
the purpose of exciting their courage or of working them up to 
fighting pitch, but to produce a voluptuous dreamy sensation. I have 
heard of pituri producing a fierce excitement, but I have never seen 
it, as far North as I have been, It may be that there are other 
