236 
Minutes of the 
blush of rosy red on the breast and abdomen ; back, wings and 
tail light grey, becoming darker on the primaries; irides brownish 
red; bill flesh-colour, except at the tip, where it is washed with 
blackish brown ; feet orange red. 
Total length, 13 inches; bill, ; wing, 8J ; tail, 6i; tarsi, g. 
Hab. Houtmann’s Abrolhos, off the western coast of Australia. 
(To be continued.) 
MINUTES OF THE TASMANIAN SOCIETY. 
January 13, 1847. 
Read the following extracts from a letier from Dr. E. C. Hobson, 
dated Melbourne, Port Phillip, 13th October, 1846, addressed to 
Mr. Ronald C. Gunn. 
“ With this you will receive a piece of fossil resin from the 
limestone of Point Nepean. It burns freely with an aromatic 
odour not unlike that from the resin of the Kauri (Dammara) 
Pine of New Zealand. 
“ The other day a bottle which had been thrown overboard from 
the unfortunate ship George the Third, about 60 miles S. of Van 
Diemen’s Land, in 1835, was found in the bay of Port Phillip, 
about sixteen miles from Melbourne. Whether this bottle has 
been floating about ever since, or has been for some time buried 
in the sand, and only exhumed by the late strong southerly gales, 
1 know not, but that it was found there is no doubt. Another 
bottle was found near Cape Liptrap, which had been thrown over¬ 
board by Sir James C. Ross, from H.M.S. Erebus, in lat. 53° 
59' S. long. 60° 47' W. The first is singularly curious in the 
fact of the bottle hitting the very narrow entrance into Port 
Phillip Bay.” 
Mr. Gunn observed upon the first part of this letter that a very 
similar resin is found in sandstone at Macquarie Plains a few 
miles above New Norfolk, in Van Diemen’s Land. The" inde¬ 
structibility of resin by the ordinary action of water, or the 
weather, would tend to preserve it in many situations, in a fossil 
state, for vast periods. Few of the present Tasmanian Conferee 
yield resin in large quantities. 
Mr. Ronald C. Gunn read notes of a botanical excursion to 
Lake St. Clair, and to the summit of Mount Olympus. The esti¬ 
mated height of the latter is about 5000 feet above the sea level. 
Mr. Gunn observed that the vegetation on the east and west 
sides of the Lake were very different and distinct. On the east 
