6 
Engagements in the botanical perlustration of tropical Australia, for 
which His Excellency has been pleased to sanction my absence for the next 
and the current year, render it impossible to devote any time for the most 
desirable researches into the utility of so many of our native plants ; but I have 
succeeded in finishing my systematic labors on the Flora of Victoria, so far as 
the material for it was accumulated, and an outline of the more interesting 
new plants has been furmshed for the Journals of the Philosophical Society 
and the Victorian Institute. A more extensive information on our native 
plants was forwai'ded to Sir William Hooker, and I trust that, on account of 
the great alliance of the Victorian and Tasmanian plants, these manuscripts 
will prove to be useful in the elaboration of the Flora of Van Diemen’s Land, 
which is now to be published, under the auspices of the Imperial Government, 
by Dr. J. Hooker. 
A splendid collection of Algse, procured on our shores by Professor 
Harvey, fonns a valuable addition to our herbarium. The whole of the col- 
lections may at all times be consulted in the Botanic Garden ; and I hope 
sincerely that the labor which I have bestowed on these collections will not 
be in undue proportion to the information which they are intended to convey. 
A regular transmission of botanical specimens to Kew has also been 
continued. 
Steps have likewise been taken to procure from other countries such 
plants as promise to become of use to the Colony ; and it is gi'atifying to 
know that Nature has favored us with a soil and with a climate in which aU 
treasures of the vegetation dispersed through extra-tropical countries may be 
reared in perfection and abundance. 
I have the honor to be. 
Sir, 
Your most obedient and humble Servant, 
FERDINAND MUELLER, 
Government Botanist. 
The Honorable 
The Colonial Secretary. 
