THE

JOHN - CRAIG

LIBRARY

COLLEGE
OF

AGRICULTURE

 

 

 

 
 

Eucalyptus Globulus.
POREST (ULTURE

Hucalyptus ‘Trees.

BY

BLuEWOOD COOPER. edibrr-

The only Complete and Reliable Work on the Eucalypti
Published in the United States.

SAN FRANCISCO:
QGubery & Company, Steam Book and Ornamental Job Printers,
No, 414 Market Street, below Sansome,

ig76. i
CONTENTS.

INTRODUCTION ga ,serteoene deve eee sees 2454054544049 RRL eae
Forzst Cutrurn anp AUSTRALIAN GuM-TREES: A Lecturé
(third of a series), delivered by Ellwood Cooper, Nov.
26, 1875, before the Santa Barbara College Association..
DEscRIPTIONS OF THIRTY-TWO VARIETIES OF EUCALYPTUS-
TREES: Copied from the Pamphlets of Baron Ferd. von
Mullery s2 sec: 2524 4424 x See net ciaeeeaee ete He aay
Descriprion or TWENTY VARIETIES: Copied from the Plant
Catalogue of Anderson, Hall & Co., Sydney
Forrst Cutturg m rrs Retations to InpusTRiaAL Pur-
surrs: By Baron Ferd. von Mueller..................
APPLICATION oF PHYTOLOGY To THE INDUSTRIAL PURPOSES
oF Lire: By Baron Ferd. von Mueller...............
AUSTRALIAN VecxTaTion: By Baron Ferd. von Mueller....
Santa BARBARA COLLEGE CATALOGUE. ........000eeeeueee

31

40

45

167

205
INTRODUCTION.

 

In presenting to the public a printed copy of my
‘¢ Lecture on Forest Planting and Australian Gum-
Trees,’’ delivered before the Santa Barbara College
Association, for the benefit of the library, it is neces-
sary to preface the lecture by the statement that it
appears in print in consequence of repeated demands
for the publication from several localities in the south-
ern part of California. Forest protection, the want
of trees, in almost every part of the State, is mani-
fest to all owners of land, who are eager to begin the
planting ; the only question being—What shall we
plant? The rapidity of growth of the Blue Gum,
and the facility with which it can be propagated,

‘is-a feature of great importance; but information is
wanted. Much that has been written on the subject
is mere speculative theories, often contradictory, and
too uncertain to merit the confidence necessary to
base such an important industry. This industry not
only necessitates that the protection should be cheap-
ly and quickly obtained, but that the tree should have
a value for mechanical or other purposes. This value
gives confidence to the planter, without which it can
not be expected the work will goon. The inquiry
comes, What is the value of the tree? This is the

2
6 * INDRODUCTION.

vital question to the man who invests money, time,
or labor in the enterprise, and the question I have
aimed to answer.

In treating of forest-planting I have, to some
extent, done nothing more than give the opinions
of great writers on the subject, and in their own
language.

The sources of original ideas in any subject are few.
I have, therefore, thought it wiser to copy than give
anything of my own, less impressive.

In a short essay the subject could not be handled
with anything like completeness, and in gathering
together fragments from the writings of Franklin B.
Hough, the Hon. Geo. P. Marsh, Prof. Lovoe, and
others, I have selected that which I thought most
valuable, having in view but the one- purpose — to
present something to the public that would impress
them with the importance of this industry.

In the investigation I learned, through my corre-
spondence with the Hon. Thos. Adamson, Jr., Unit-
ed States Consul - general at Melbourne, that Baron
Ferd. von Mueller, of Australia, had published sev-
eral pamphlets on the ‘‘ Hucalyptus-trees, and the Im--
portance of Forest Culture,” but that a copy could not
be obtained. Mr. Adamson, however, wrote that the
Baron would send the copies in his possession provid-
ed I would have them published at my own risk, in
a connected form. I have deemed the subject of so
great and vital importance that I present to the pub.
lic, in this book, a part of the writings of this valua-
ble author:

First. —“ Descriptions of Thirty-two Varieties of the
Hucalypti Family.” :
INTRODUCTION. 7

Second. —‘« Forest Culture in its Relations to Indus-
trial Pursuits.”

Third.— Application of Phytology to the Indus-
trial Purposes of Life.”

. Fourth.—“ Australian Vegetation.”

I have in addition to the above the following, which
will soon appear in a separate volume :

First.—‘‘The Trees of Australia, Phytologically
Named and Arranged, with Indications of their Ter-
ritorial Distribution.” :

Second.—‘‘The Principal Timber-trees Readily
Eligible for Victorian Industrial Culture, with Indi-
cations of their Native Countries, and some of their
Technologic Uses.”

Third.—‘‘ Select Plants (exclusive of timber-trees)
Readily Eligible for Victorian Industrial Culture,
with Indications of their Native Countries and Some
of their Uses.”

Fourth, — Additions to ‘Select Plants.’ ”

Fifth. —“ Second Supplement tothe ‘Select Plants.”

Sixth.—‘ The objects of a Botanic Garden in Rela-
tion to Industries.”

ELLWOOD COOPER.
FOREST CULTURE

Nustalian Gum Trees:
A LECTURE

(Third of a Series)

Delivered by ELILWOOD COOPER,

NoveEMBER 26TH, 1875, BEFORE THE SANTA BaRPARA COLLEGE ASSOCIATION,

‘¢ The presence of stately ruins in solitary deserts is
conclusive proof that great climatic changes have
taken place within the period of human history, in
many eastern countries, once highly cultivated and
densely peopled, but now arid wastes.

‘¢ Although the records of geology teach that great
vicissitudes of climate, from the torrid and humid
conditions of the coal period to those of extreme cold
which produced the glaciers of the drift, may have in
turn occurred in the same region, we have no reason
to believe that any material changes have been brought
about, by astronomical or other natural causes, within
the historic period. We cannot account for the changes
that have occurred since these sunburnt and sterile
plains, where these traces of man’s first civilization
are found, were clothed with a luxuriant vegetation,
except by ascribing them to the improvident acts of
10 FOREST CULTURE AND

man in destroying the trees and plants which once
clothed the surface and sheltered it from the sun and
the winds. As this shelter was removed the desert
approached, gaining new power as its area increased,
until it crept over vast regions once populous and fer-
tile, and left only the ruins of former magnificence.”

‘¢ There are parts of Asia Minor, of Northern Africa,
of Greece, and even of Alpine Europe, where the
operation of causes set in action by man has brought
the face of the earth to a desolation almost as com-
plete as that of the moon. And though, within the
brief space of time men call the ‘ historical period,’
they are known to have been covered with luxuriant
woods, verdant pastures, and fertile meadows, they
are now too far deteriorated to bereclaimable by man.
Nor can they becomeagain fitted for human use except
through great geological changes, or other mysterious
influences or agencies of which we have no present
knowledge, and over which we have no prospective
control. The earth is fast becoming an unfit home for
its noblestinhabitants, and another era of equal human
crime and human improvidence, and of like duration
with that through which traces of that crime and im-
providence extend, would reduce it to sucha condition
of impoverished productiveness, of shattered surface,
of climatic excess, as to threaten the depravation,
barbarism, and ‘perhaps even extinction of the spe-
cies.”

«¢ In European countries, especially in Itaby, Germany,
Austria, and France, where the injuries resulting
from the cutting off of timber have long since been
realized, the attention of governments has been turned
to this subject by the necessities of the case, and con-
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 11

servative measures have, in many instances, been
successfully applied, so that a supply of timber has
been obtained, by cultivation, and other benefits re-
sulting from this measure have been realized.”

In these countries there are over two dozen schools
of forestry, where special instruction is imparted to
the youth who are to take the future care of the pub-
lic forests and private plantations.

The attention of our Government was called to the
importance of reserving timber for our navy, and an
Act was passed March 1, 1817, making reservations
of public lands for this purpose. This Act, however,
proved ineffectual, and has along time since been dis-
regarded, and there is nothing at the present time to
prevent the complete destruction of every wooded
spot in the country.

‘The preservation of forests is one of the first inter-
ests of society, and consequently one of the first du-
ties of government. All the wants of life are closely
related to their preservation; agriculture, architect-
ure, and almost all the industries seek therein their
aliment and resources, which nothing could replace.

“* Necessary as are the forests to the individual, they
are not less so to the state. It is from thence that
commerce finds the means of transportation and ex-
change, and that governments claim the elements of
their protection, their safety, and even their glory.

‘¢Tt is not alone from the wealth which they offer by
their working, under wise regulation, that we may
judge of their utility. Their existence is of itself of
incalculable benefit to the countries that possess them,
as well in the protection and feeding of the springs
and rivers as in their prevention against the washing
12 FOREST CULTURE AND

away of the soil upon mountains, and in the beneficial
and healthful influence which they exert upon the
atmosphere.

‘¢Large forests deaden and break the force of nee
winds that beat out the seeds and injure the growth
of plants; they form reservoirs of moisture; they
shelter the soil of the fields, and upon hill-sides, where
the rain-waters, checked in their descent by the thous-
and obstacles they present by their roots and the trunks
of trees, have time to filter into the soil and only find
their way by slow degrees to the rivers. They regu-
late, in a certain degree, the flow of the waters and
the hygrometrical condition of the atmosphere, and
their destruction accordingly increases the duration
of droughts and gives rise to the injuries of inunda-
tions, which denude the face of the mountains.

‘¢The destruction of forests has often become to
the country where this has happened a real calamity
and a speedy cause of approaching decline and ruin.
Their injury and reduction below the degree of pres-
ent or future wants is among the misfortunes which
we should provide against, and one of those errors
which nothing can excuse, and which nothing but
centuries of perseverance and privation can repair.

‘¢ But there is another and more cheering erain this
history. This is when civilization has advanced, and
man, under the safeguard of laws, sets about restoring
the desolated forest. The cultivation of wood then
becomes an art founded upon principles, and pursued
for the gratification of taste, or for purposes of utility.
Like every one who labors from choice, the planter
experiences gratification in his pursuit. The little
tree which he places in the ground quickly becomes
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 138

a part of the landscape around ; and thus the taste is
gratified almost as soon as the work is done. In afew
years more his woods yield shelter from the winds,
and thus increase the value of the lands around, while
it is rarely beyond the expectations of human life to
look for a direct profit from the wood as it advances
to maturity. To expend capital on planting, indeed,
is merely to lay out a fund to increase at interest.
Planting, then, may be readily rendered the means,
on the part of a landed proprietor, of setting aside a
fund for any specific purpose—as for a provision for a
family ; and no man is deemed peculiarly disinterest-
ed who merely obeys a dictate of reason and humanity
and provides for hisdescendants. The planter, then,
has his motives of rational interest to justify him in
the opinion of those who look only to gain. He lays
out his capital with a view to a profitable return. He
improves the value of his estate, while, in the prac-
tice of his art, he finds the materials of an innocent
recreation. It may be questioned whether, in the
whole range of rural occupations, one more interesting
pursuit presents itself than the superintendence of a
growing wood, presenting to the eye at every season
new objects of interest and solicitude. Where is the
planter who would wish the workmanship of his hands
undone, and who does not look with an honest pride
on the beautiful creation which, with a generous spirit,
he has raised up around him ?”’

These considerations present a problem not difficult
of solution—possibly difficult to educate land-owners
of their truthfulness.

We must make the people familiar with the facts
and the necessities of the case. It must come to be

*2
14 FOREST CULTURE AND

understood that a tree ora forest planted is an invest-
ment of capital, increasing annually in value as it
grows, like money at interest, and worth at any time
what it has cost, including the expense of planting
and the interest which this money would have earned
at the given date. The great masses of our rural
population and land-owners should be inspired with
correct ideas as to the importance of planting and
preserving trees, and taught the profits that may be de-
rived from planting waste spots with timber, where
nothing else would grow to advantage. They should
learn the increased value of farms which have the
roadsides lined with avenues of trees, and should un-
derstand the worth of the shelter which belts of tim-
ber afford to fields, and the general increase of wealth
and beauty which the country would realize from the
united and well-directed efforts of the owners of land
in thus enriching and beautifying their estates.

The demand for lumber increases in the United
States at the rate of twenty-five per cent. per annum.
The decrease of forests is at the rate of 7,000,000 acres
annually. Few people have any idea ofthe immense
value of the wood which is used for purposes gen-
erally considered unimportant. The fences of the
United States are now valued at $1,800,000,000, and
it costs, annually, $98,000,000 to keep them in repair.
By far the greatest proportion of these are wood. The
railroads of the United States use 150,000,000 of ties
annually.

There are establishments manufacturing articles of
wood alone, numbering 118,684, employing 7,440,000
persons, and using wood valued at $554,000,000 an-
nually,
EUCALYPTUS TREES, 15

A seventy-four gun ship swallows up no less than
150,000 cubic feet, requiring 2,000 large, well-grown
timber trees. Supposing these trees should stand
thirty-three feet apart, it would require the timber of
fifty acres to build one such ship.

According to a statistical table published by our
Government in 1874, there was in the New England,
Middle, and Western States an average of thirty-three
per cent. of wooded land. ‘‘ In France and Germany it
has been estimated that at least one fifth of the land
should be planted with forest trees in order to main-
tain the proper hygrometric and electric equilibrium
for successful farming.”? ‘¢ Mirabeau estimated that
thereshould be retained inFrance thirty-two per cent.
of land in wood.’ In the State of Texas, it is represent-
ed that there isan area four times that of the State of
Pennsylvania, without a tree or a shrub. In Califor-
nia there is only 4, per cent. It is to this State I
eall your attention, and to this people my lecture is
directed. We have, perhaps, the most healthful,
most equable, the best climate on this globe, and the
only objections that can be urged are the prevailing
high wind, and an uncertain, as well as an insuffi-
cient, quantity of rain-fall. Moderate the winds, in-
crease the rain, and we have perfection. This result
is so easily and so quickly to be obtained that it ought
to have the attention and serious consideration of every
land-owner in the State. How is this to be done?
How are we to obtain this result? By planting for-
est trees. I would recommend belts from 100 to 150
feet in width, each quarter of a mile, planted at right
angles with the prevailing direction of the winds,
and to line all the highways, parallel with or to the
16 FOREST CULTURE AND

general currents, with belts of two or three rows,
closely planted. This planting would occupy about
one eighth of the land. Then again, it would be par-
ticularly desirable to plant allthe banks of gulches,
four or five rows on either side, in order to prevent
further washing ; also, allsteep side-hills inconvenient
to cultivate, or any waste lands that are non-produc-
ing. Trees will grow in places where nothing else
can be cultivated. A soil too coarse and meager for
the cereals may be marvelously productive in forest
growth. Ravines and slopes too steep for any other
useful product are the favorite seats of timber. Tak-
ing belts of land situated similarly to that part of Santa
Barbara county lying between Point Conception, Rin-
con Point, the Santa Inez Mountains, and the ocean,
if planted as above, fully one fourth would be occupied
by trees. It is known and proved that the three
fourths of the surface will produce more, if protected
by trees planted on the other fourth, than the whole
would without the trees, and without the protection.
Consequently the possessor loses nothing in the pro-
ductiveness of his farm, but, on the contrary, he in-
creases the certainty of his crops, decreases one fourth
his labor, beautifies his home, improves the climate,
doubles the value of his land, receives inspiration
from this work of his own hands, elevates his own
condition, and adds to the refinement of himself, his
family, and all his surroundings.

By reason of the ‘mildness of the climate and the
discovery of the Zucalyptus, or what is known as Aus-
tralian Gum-tree, we can, in our generation, create
forests of these trees, and bring about all these condi-
tions to be enjoyed by ourselves. No other country
EUCALYPTUS TREES, 17

is so susceptible ; to no other country can we look for
equal results,

* The Hucalyptus globulus (known as the Blue Gum,
and so generally admired in California) is a native
of Tasmania. It has received the name Hucalyptus on
account of the formation of the seed-pods. The name
is from two Greek words, signifying ‘<I conceal well,’’
the cup for a long time concealing the stamens. The
name globulus was taken from the resemblance to a but-
ton. The discovery was made by a French botanist
by the name of Labillardiere. This gentleman was a
member of a French expedition, fitted out in 1791, and,
quoting from his journal: ‘(12th May, 1792. [The
expedition was then in the port of Entrecasteaux, in
the Bay of Tempests, Van Dieman’s Land.] I have
not yet b2en able to procure the flowers of a new spe-
cies of Eucalyptus, remarkable for its fruit, which
resembles a coat-button. This tree, which is one of
the tallest in nature, since it measures upward of
one hundred and sixty feet, only blooms toward its
upper extremity. The wood is suited to naval con-
struction, and is durable, but neither so light nor so
elastic as pine. This beautiful tree, of the myrtle
family, is covered with a smooth hark ; the branches
bend a little as they rise, and are garnished at the
extremities with alternate leaves, slightly curved,
and about seven inches in length and nearly two in
width. The flowers are solitary, and grow out of the
axils of the leaves. The bark, leaves, and fruit are
aromatic, and might be employed for economical uses,
in place of those which the Moluccas have hitherto
exclusively furnished us.”’ ‘In the history of the

 

* Copied from the translation from the French of Prof. J, E. Planchon,
18 FOREST CULTURE AND

future naturalization of the Hucalyptus Mueller is the
savant who justly calculated the future of the tree,
traced it in its itineracy, and predicted its destiny.
Ramel is the enthusiastic amateur who has thrown
body and mind into the mission of propagating it.
Both have faith; but one is a prophet, the other an
apostle, and, in the noble confraternity of services,
public gratitude will not separate the names that are
bound together by friendship.’”? ‘The Hucalyptus
- globulus, known as the Blue Gum, was introduced
into Algeria in 1854, while its name and properties
were unknown. It isnow being planted by hundreds
of thousands, in groves, in avenues, in groups, in iso-
lated stalks, in every section of three provinces.”” A
colonist and ardent planter, M. Trottier, regarded this
tree as possessing a forest substance capable one day
of enriching the colony, and he took for the motto of
one of his writings the following: ‘‘The wood of the
Eucalyptus will be the great product of Algeria.’’
Carrying his confidence still further, he saw the des-
ert retreating before this colonized tree, and, specu-
lating upon the incontestible fact that the forest created
humidity and changed the hygrometrical régime of
a country, and remembering, besides, the subterrane-
ous sheets of water beneath the arid surface of this
region, he boldly named another pamphlet ‘The
Wooded Desert and Colonies,” thus conceiving the idea
that the great SAHARA DESERT could be reclaimed
by planting this tree. He estimated the profits from
planting the Zucalyptus in the colonies of Algeria to
be from one thousand stalks, in five years, to yield
a gross revenue of $240, and $10,650 in twenty-six
years. He based the estimate on the annual growth,
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 19

from actual measurement, of four and one half inches
in circumference yearly. At Hamma and at Cannes,
near Algiers, the growth in height of young trees
averages nineteen inches per month. A stalk one
year old, planted in May, attained the height of
nineteen feet the following December; the year after
it grew nineteen feet; the year after it grew nine-
teen feet; the latter part of the third year this
impulse diminished, but, at the end of fifteen years,
the tree was over seventy feet in height.

At ‘¢Ellwood,’’ my home, twelve miles west of Santa
Barbara, I have growing about fifty thousand trees,
The oldest were transplanted in February, three years
ago. These trees, however, have not done so well as
those planted one year later, for the reason that the
roots were too much confined —the transplanting
delayed too long. The best growth obtained, under
the most favorable circumstances, isa tree growing
near my house, three years and one or two months
from the seed. Transplanted two years and ten
months, is nine and one half inches in diameter and
forty-two feet six inches high. There is another tree
near by, same age, transplanted at the same time,
not so large in the trunk, but has attained the height
of forty-five feet six inches, equal to forty-seven hun-
dredths of an inch per day, fourteen and seven nine-
teenths inches per month, and, in order to attain a
height of four hundred feet, would have to continue
on growing at this rate for twenty-eight years. Nine
and one half inches in diameter for three years and
two months is equal to three inches yearly, or nine
and forty-three hundredths in circumference yearly.
To make a tree sixteen feet jn diameter would have
20 FOREST CULTURE AND

to continue on growing in the same ratio for sixty-
four years. My last planting was June 25th, The
seeds were sown six months before. These trees were
purposely kept back—stunted, I may say —as I
desired to transplant them only after the disappear-
ance of grasshoppers. From the 25th of June these
trees, averaging six to eight inches in height, have
now reached six feet (or a great many of them) in the
short space of five months. The greatest possible
results have been obtained on every part of my place.
I have experimented on two steep hill-sides, so stony
and rocky that plowing or preparing the ground was
impossible; putting them in with a pick, without
water, and after the rains were over. On one hill-
side I cultivated with the hoe as best I could; on the
other did nothing—the mustard, in some places, grow-
ing up around the trees seven to eight feet high.
The trees cultivated have done very much better than
the others. Whether this kind of planting is practi-
cable can only be determined at the end of the next
year.

It is claimed for the Hucalyptus that it resists Sum-
mer dryness, and profits by the rains of the Autumn,
Winter, and Spring, wherever the mildness of the
climate permits it to vegetate without interruption.
I have made no other special observations with regard
to the growth of this tree, excepting on Gen, Naglee’s
place, in San Jose, where I found trees, ten years old,
eighteen inches in diameter, and, I should think,
eighty to ninety feet high. <‘#Many species of the
Eucalyptus are, in their native country, truly gigantic
trees. A Eucalyptus colossea has measured nearly four
hundred feet in height, and a Zucalypius amygdalina
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 21

from four hundred and sixteen to four hundred and
seventy-one feet. One of the latter species has reached
the height of five hundred feet, which is twenty feet
higher than the Pyramid of Cheops, the tallest struct-
ure in the world. This tree would cast a shadow
upon the summit of the great Pyramid. A giant
Eucalyptus of Tasmania was not less than thirty feet
in diameter near the soil, the height being about
three hundred feet. :

Without .expecting such vast proportions in gen-
eral, the Eucalyptus globulus is not the less the lar-
gest forest-tree in the world — excepting only the
‘« Sequoia Gigantea,’’ or Big Tree of California. <‘In
its juvenile state it isa finished type of elegance. In
its adult period, it is a magnificent representation of
strength.’? The trunk can supply immense planks.
One was sent to the London Exhibition, in 1862,
measuring seventy-five feet in length, and about ten
feet in width. Australia desired to send a plank one
hundred and sixty-five feet long, but no ship could be
found to transport it. The English Navy begins to
appreciate the wood for its solidity, durability, and
tenacity. The best whale-ships that furrow the South
American Seas are those of Hobart Town; the keels
of which are made of the Eucalyptus globulus. The
wood of the Hucalyptus combines density of texture
with rapidity of growth. This growth is particularly
rapid during its juvenile period, but it does not cease
to grow in height until it is twenty-four years old.
After this age, the trunks, which are generally very
straight, only increase in diameter. Compact and
tenacious, the wood, owing to the presence of resinous
materials, possesses a sort of incorruptibility, which
22 FOREST CULTURE AND

allows it to remain a long time in contact with salt
water. It is equally durable in the ground as is the
Oak, and can be employed with advantage for sleep-
ers for railroads. The durability of the wood makes
it valuable for the keels of vessels, for the construc-
tion of bridges, piers, and viaducts,

‘The Eucalyptus is not only valuable as a wood,
but has medicinal properties, In Valencia, Spain, it
is vulgarly called the fever-tree, on account of its
properties for preventing malarial fevers. There, its
properties are so well known as a cure for fevers
that its leaves are often plundered, and in a public
garden of a great city, it is necessary to surround the
fever-tree with a guard, in order to preserve it from
being stripped. It has, also, disinfectant virtues, and
is antiseptic for wounds—its essential oil being a
stimulant, and the tannin in the leaves, acting as a
tonic astringent applied exteriorly, hastens the heal-
ing ofa wound. Various chemists have enumerated
its uses as an infusion, decoction, powder, distilled
water, tincture, extract and essence. From the most
authentic testimony, the Zucalyptus appears or seems
to be a very efficacious remedy against a great num-
ber of intermittent fevers.

‘6* Fucalyptus globulus, Blue Gum-tree of Victoria
and Tasmania. This tree is of extremely rapid growth,
and attains a height of four hundred feet, furnishing a
first-class wood. Ship-builders get keels of this timber
one hundred and twenty feet long; besides this, they
use it extensively for planking and many other parts of
the ship, and it is considered to be generally superior

 

* Thos. Adamson, Jr., U. 8. Consul-General at Melbourne, copied at my
request from the pamphlets of Baron Ferd. von Mueller, the description
here given to the £. globulus, and £. rostrata,
EUCALYPTUS TREES, 23

to American Rock Elm. A test of strength has been
made between some Blue Gum, English Oak, and In-
dian Teak. The Blue Gum carried fourteen pounds
weight more than the Oak, and seventeen and one
fourth pounds more than ‘Teak upon the square inch.
Blue Gum wood, besides being used for ship-building,
is very’extensively used by carpenters for all kinds
of out-door work ; also, for fence-rails, railway sleep-
ers—lasting about nine years—for shafts and spokes
of drays, and a variety of other purposes.’’

Eucalyptus rostrata, the Red Gum of Victoria,
South Australia, and many river-flats in the interior
of the Australian Continent. Although a native tree
of this colony, it has been introduced into this list on
account of its wood being of extraordinary endurance
under ground, and, for this reason, so highly valued
for fence-posts, piles, and railway sleepers ; for the
latter purpose it will last at least a dozen years, and,
if well-selected, much longer.

It is also extensively used by ship-builders* * *,
It should be steamed before it is worked for planking.
Next to the Jarrah, from West Australia, this is the
best wood for resisting the attacks of sea-worms and
whiteants. For other details of this and other native
trees I refer to the report of the Victorian Exhibition
of 1862 and 1867.

The tree attains a height of fully one hundred feet.

_The supply for our local wantsalready falls short, and
it cannot be obtained from Tasmania, where the tree
doés not naturally exist.”

In my correspondance with Mr. T. W. Herkimer,
who lived:ten years in Australia and Tasmania, spend.
ing about half the time in each place, and variously
%

24 FOREST CULTURE AND

engaged in mining, wood-cutting lumbering, con-
structing telegraph lines, etc., etc., I have learned the
following : That the general character of the country,
the climate, the quantity of rain-fall— except that
they may have a little more rain in Summer in Aus-
tralia and Tasmania, where the Gum Trees grow—is
very similar to the Redwood districts of California ;
the growth being ‘more rapid and the trees larger in
the coast ranges, ravines, and valleys than in any
other localities—the nearer the foot of the ranges the
better. The thicker they are planted, and the thick-
they grow, the better, as they will shade each other.
I have always noticed that all trees‘ grow taller and
straighter where they grow close together. <‘ All
trees grown onan open plain, exposed to the sun and
wind, will not grow tall, like they do in the forest,
where they are protected and shaded. Ihave seen,
in Australia and Tasmania, Blue Gums larger and
taller than I have seen Redwood; many of the Gum
Trees from fourteen to sixteen feet.in diamater, per-
fectly sound, and, I think, three hundred feet high.
The Blue Gum, if it could be grown so as to make
large trees, I think, is the most useful, for it is not
only good for posts and rails, but ties and piles.
While I was in Tasmania theré was a test made as
to the value for war purposes. It was found that a
cannon-ball would pierce the planks, cutting a round
hole, and passing through, without splitting the
planks. The experiments were so satisfactory that
the wood was pronounced as good as English Oak.
“I was appointed tosuperintend the construction of
atelegraph line from the river Lamar, on the north
coast of Tasmania, to Hobart Town, on the south
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 25

coast. We used for poles the young trees of the Blue
Gum, White Gum, Red Gun, and Stringy-bark, tak-
ing only the bark off. Wecharred the butts as faras
they went into the ground, and dipped in coal-tar.
They were expected to last ten or twelve years.
When I finished the construction of the telegraph
line I was engaged in a saw-mill on theriver Mersey,
The timber that we sawed was, as above mentioned,
Blue, ‘White, and Red Gum and Stringy-bark; we
sawed it for all purposes used in house-building, ex-
cept rustic and siding. It is used in large quantities
for piles, wharf, and bridge building. The timber-
dealers in Melbourne, and all other ports, do not make
a difference in contracting for a cargo of lumber of
colonial woods. It is generally expected that it will
be mixed. Wheelrights always select the Blue Gum,
it being considered much better for wagon-making
than most other varieties ; itis stronger and more du-
rable, and quite equal to the Hickory of this country.
It is used for axletrees, hubs, spokes, and all parts of
the running-gear. The Blue Gum is much tougher
and heavier, and will last longer than any of the oth-
ers ; in fact, it will last a life-time if taken from large
trees. The wood resembles the Rock Elm of the Kast-
ern States. I have rafted a great deal of it; when
thrown into the water green will nearly always sink
to the bottom, so that it is necessary to lash the rafts
alongside of boats to keep them on the surface. A
pile sixty feet long, fifteen inches in diameter, will
require the strength of two men to raise to the sur-
face. It weighs sixty-seven pounds to the cubic foot.

‘The Stringy-bark tree has a leaf the same as the
Blue Gum, and is known in the Australian Colonies
as the Gum Top Stringy-bark.
26 FOREST CULTURE AND

«¢ The Stringy-bark tree has a very thick bark on the
trunk, and of the same color as the bark of the Red-
wood. The Blue, White, and Red Gums, after they
become large trees, shed their bark, which grows in
growths, the outside layers, too small for the inner,
crack open, the wind gets between the growths,
tears it off in strips three or four inches wide, and
sometimes one hundred feet long; the debris cover-
ing the ground at the trunk five or six feet in depth.

««The Iron-bark tree does not grow in Tasmania ;
it is an Australian tree ; has arough bark, something
like the bark of the Black Oak of Canada, The bark
and the wood are very hard and heavy ; will sink in
water, like a stone ; will last for years ; in fact, Ido not
believe it will ever rot. The largest trees of this va-
riety I have seen were not over four feet in diameter.”’

Mr. Casey of Melbourne recommends the Hucalyp-
tus rostrata as being of great value, more hardy than
the Blue Gum, and possessing all the sanitary proper-
ties, capable of a high polish, and specially adapted
for piles and for ship-timber.

The Eucalyptus globulus, or Blue Gum, is a very
tender plant when young. It is an evergreen of
rapid growth, and the young shoots are injured by a
few degrees of frost. It is reported that trees have
been destroyed by cold at New Orleans after reaching
a height of fifteen feet.

I have selected from the one hundred to one hun-
dred and fifty species of the Eucalypti family the fol-
lowing varieties: Eucalyptus globulus, E. rostrata, E.
marginata, E. syderoxylon, BE. brachypoda, E. obli-
qua, E. platyphilla, E. phonicea, and E. amygdalina.*

 

* The description as given in the lecture is omitted in this place, as it
appears more fully on pages 32 to 39,
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 27

Propagation.—My plan of germinating the seeds
and transplanting to permanent sites is as follows: I
have found, from repeated experiments, that it is bet-
ter to germinate the seeds in boxes, a convenient size
for handling, say two and one half to three feet square
and sixinches deep, placing first about four inches of
good sandy soil or loam ; then about one inch of pure
sand (I use sea sand), and cover the sand with sawdust
made from dry or well-seasoned wood, about one inch
deep. Plant the seeds in the sawdust half an inch deep
or more ; thoroughly wet the whole, and keep the top
moist. Ifthe seeds are fresh and good they will sprout
and come through on the eighth day. I have found
no difficulty in sprouting them in the open air during
the months of August, September, and October. It
is, however, better to raise them under glass—the
greater the heat the better success; but as soon as
fairly up, put out in the air and sunlight. In six to
eight weeks after the seeds are planted the trees will
be large enough for transplanting to permanent sites.
There is no time that they can be handled with equal
success as when about six weeks old, or four to six
inches high. The earth or place in which to be
planted should be well cultivated, thesoil smooth and
free from clods, the trees set out just before rain, or
in the evenings with a little water, the ordinary care
required for setting out cabbage-plants will prove suc-
cessful with the little Blue Gum plants. It is, how-
ever, better to take advantage of approaching rains.
I have, with ten men, transplanted as many as seven
thousand in an afternoon, and have ninety-five per
cent. live. The above plan of transplanting is only
practicable during the rainy season. Ifthe ground is
38 FOREST CULTURE AND

well cultivated during the Winter and kept entirely
clean the trees can be transplanted at any time dur-
ing the Summer or dry season. To do this, however,
it will be necessary to transplant. from boxes where
germinated into other boxes, allowing about three
inches square of soil and six inches deep, for each lit-
tle tree, so that the soil with tree can be placed in the
ground where they are permanently to grow, without
disturbing or exposing the roots. There should be
about half a bucket of water to each tree—the water
put into the hole, and immediately after it disappears
the tree set in. .

It is estimated of the Blue Gum that there are fifty
thousand seeds in one pound, and that forty thousand
will grow, being equal to two thousand five hundred
to the ounce.

Eucalyptus rostrata, or Red Gum.—There are, of
this variety, at least double the number, and equal to
five thousand trees to the ounce. The plan of germinat-
ing the seeds of this tree is very similar to that of the
Blue Gum, excepting that there must be not over half
the quantity of sawdust, and no sand required ; the
seeds planted nearer the surface, and more heat neces-
sary. The manner of transplanting the same as the
Blue Gum.

Irecommend in forest-planting that the trees be
set six to seven feet apart, and in rows, where it is
possible, so as to cultivate with a horse, while the
trees are small. Six by seven will give one thousand
trees to the acre. After five years’ growth remove
three fourths of them, leaving about two hundred and
fifty of the straightest and best trees. My estimate
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 29

of income from the three fourths to be thinned out is
as follows:

Seven hundred fence-posts, worth .... 1... .ce0 seen sees cece $100
Cord wood, Worth, ssjeis:seiseis cress wees Muss: ie dehesianeews Yom ways 100

$200
Expense preparing and marketing. .... 2... ..60 sees sees. 100

Profits $100, equal to $20 sak year, and better
than barley crops, with all the value left on the
ground. At the end of fifty years the two hundred
and fifty trees left standing would be worth $10,000,
and equivalent to one hundred per cent. profit on the
investment, allowing the land to be worth $100 per
acre, and interest compounded at ten per cent. per
year. M. Trottier’s estimate gives as much in half
the number of years.

The estimate of profit on one acre of White Ash, in
the Western States, at the end of twelve years, is
$600.

The measurement of trees in Springfield, Ohio,
twenty years’ growth, one foot above the ground:
Larch, 103 inches; Birch, 103; Elm, 144; Spruce,
14; Burr Oak, 15. They are planting in the Prairie
States one hundred and fifty million trees annually,
occupying about two hundred thousand acres, and
equal to about one thirty- fifth of the destruction
throughout the entire country.

Humboldt, the great philosopher, said: ‘‘ Men, in
all climates, seem to bring upon future generations
two calamities at once—a want of fuel and a scarcity
of water.”

A blessing has been pronounced upon the man who
would make two blades of grass grow in place of one,
How much more is this due to the man who plants a
tree where nothing grew before.
30 FOREST CULTURE AND

Taking in view the conditions so favorable for tree-
planting in California, and the great necessity of for-
est protection, the only wonder is that something as
I have suggested was not commenced several years
ago. The reasons are so many and so obvious that
there is not a question as to the necessity; and if a
necessity, it becomes the duty of every land-owner to
begin at once to plant trees. It is also clear that in
whatever it is our duty to act it is our duty to study.
I have therefore thought it worth while to present to
you in this lecture a few sketches, which cannot but
prove useful till they give place to something better.
If the effort creates in the minds of the people an inter.
est in the subject, all that could be hoped for will be
accomplished. No one disputes the importance of
planting on the plan suggested ; neither can the feasi-
bility be questioned. Contemplate the beauty, the
grandeur, the productiveness of the great valleys of
the Sacramento, the San Joaquin, the Salinas plain,
and of every strip of arable land in the State, with
belts of Eucalyptus -trees planted as I have recom-
mended. With such shelter California would become
the paradise of the world. :

How is this to be brought about? By convincing
owners of land that financially it will be a great suc-
cess. Individual effort alone must accomplish the
work. We cannot look to the State for either aid or
protection, as, in this tndependent, free Republic, the
Government or the State is powerless in the execution
of any measure that would compel land-owners to
plant trees, no matter how urgent the necessity or
how important the duty. What we have therefore to
do, as individuals, is to begin at once to plant. It is
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 31

an obligation we owe to the possessory title to land ;
and financially we will be amply rewarded for our
labors.

The following I have copied from a pamphlet, en-
titled «‘ The Principal Timber-Trees Readily Eligible
for Victorian Industrial Culture,” by Baron Ferd.
von Mueller. (The same offered to the Victorian
Acclimation Society—pages 20, 21, and 22):

EUCALYPTUS AMYGDALINA (Labill.). —In our
sheltered, springy forest glens, attaining not rarely a
height of over four hundred feet, there forming a
smooth stem and broad leaves, producing also seed-
lings of a foliage different to the ordinary state of
uc. amygdalina, as occurs in more open country.
‘This species or variety, which might be called Euca-
lyptus regnous, represents the loftiest tree in British
territory, and ranks next to the Sequoia Wellingtonia
in size anywhere on the globe. The wood is fissile,
well adapted for shingles, rails, for house-building,
for the keelson and planking of ships, and other pur-
poses. Labillardiere’s name applies ill to any of the
forms of this species. Seedlings raised on rather
barren ground near Melbourne have shown the same
amazing rapidity of growth as those of the Zuc,
globulus ; yet, like those of Huc. obliqua, they are not
so easily satisfied with any soil.

_ EUCALYPTUS CITRIODORA (Hooker). —Queensland.
It combines with the ordinary qualities of many Eu-
calypts the advantage of yielding from its leaves a
rather large supply of volatile oil, of excellent lemon-
like fragrance.

EUCALYPTUS DIVERSICOLOR (F. v. Mueller),—The
Karri of S. W. Australia. A colossal tree, excep-
32 FoRESt CULTURE AND

tionally reaching to the height of four hundred feet,
with a proportionate girth of the stem. The timber
is excellent. Fair progress of growth is shown by the
young trees, planted even in dry, exposed localities
in Melbourne. The shady foliage and dense growth
of the tree. promise to render it -one of our best for
avenues. In its native localities it occupies fertile,
‘ather humid valleys. .

EUCALYPTUS GLOBULUS (Labill.).—Blue Gum of
Victoria and Tasmania. This tree is of extremely
rapid growth, and attains a height of four hundred
feet, furnishing a first-class wood. Ship-builders get
keels of this timber one hundred and twenty feet long ;
besides this, they use it extensively for planking, and
many other parts of the ship, and it is considered to
be generally superior to American Rock Elm. A test
of strength has been made between some Blue Gum,
English Oak, and Indian Teak, The Blue Gum car-
ried fourteen pounds weight more than the Oak, and
seventeen pounds four ounces more than Teak, upon
the square inch. Blue Gum wood,‘besides being used
for ship-building, is very extensively used by carpen-
ters for all kinds of out-door work ; also, for fence-rails,
railway-sleepers—lasting about nine years—for shafts
and spokes of drays, and a variety of other purposes.

EUCALYPTUS GOMPHOCEPHALA (Candolle), — The
Tooart of 8. W. Australia. Attains a height of fifty
feet. The wood is close-grained, hard, and not rend-
‘ing. Itis used for ship-building, wheelwright’s work,
and other purposes of artisans,

EUCALYPTUS MARGINATA (Smith).—The Jarrah or
Mahogany tree of S. W. Australia, famed for its inde-
structible wood, which is attacked neither by che-
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 33

lura, nor teredo, nor termites, and therefore so much
sought for jetties and other structures exposed to sea-
water ; also for any underground work, and largely
exported for railway sleepers. Vessels built of this
timber have been enabled to do away with all copper-
plating. It is very strong, of a close grain and a
slightly oily and resinous nature. It works well,
makes a fine finish, and is by ship-builders here con-
sidered superior to either Oak, Teak, or, indeed, any
any other wood. The tree grows chiefly on iron-
stone ranges.

At Melbourne itis not quick of growth, if compared
to our Blue Gum (Fue. globulus, Lab.), or to our
Stringy-bark (E. obliqua, ’1 Her.), but it is likely to
grow with celerity in our ranges.

EUCALYPTUS ROSTRATA (Schlechtendal).* — The
Red Gum of Victoria, South Australia, and many river-
flats in the interior of the Australian continent. Al-
though a native tree of this colony, it has been intro-
duced into this list on account of its wood being of
extraordinary endurance under ground, and for this
reason so highly valued for fence-posts, piles, and rail-
way sleepers; for the latter purpose it will last at
least a dozen years, and if well-selected, much long-
er. Itis also extensively used by ship-builders, for
main stem, stern-post, inner post, deadwood, floor tim-
bers, futtocks, transoms, knight-head, hawse-pieces,
cant, stern, quarter and fashion timber, bottom-planks,
breast-hooks, and riders, windlass, bow-rails, ete., etc.
It should be steamed before it is worked for planking.
Next to the Jarrah, from West Australia, this is the
oe Second supplement by the same author. It is said of this variety that

instances are on record of the stem having attained a girth of sixty feet, at
six feet from the ground, through the formation of buttresses.

 
34 FOREST CULTURE AND

best wood for resisting the attacks of sea-worms and
white ants. For other details of the uses of this and
other native trees, refer to the reports of the Victori-
an Exhibitions of 1862 and 1867. The trees attain
a height of fully one hundred feet. The supply for
our local wants falls already short, and cannot be ob-
tained from Tasmania, where the tree does not nat-
urally exist.

EUCALYPTUS SIDEROXYLON (Cunn). — Iron - bark
tree. It attains a height of one hundred feet, and
supplies a valuable timber, possessing great strength
and hardness. It is much prized for its durability
by carpenters, ship- builders, ete. It is largely em-
ployed by wagon - builders, for wheels, poles, ete. ;
by ship-builders for top-sides, tree-nails, the rudder
(stock), belaying-pins, and’ other purposes; it is also
used by turners, for rough work. This is considered
the strongest wood in our colony. It is much rec-
ommended for railway-sleepers, and extensively used
in underground mining work.

[Copied from an additional list offered to the same
society by the same author, and published by said so-
ciety in 1874—pages 64, 65, 66, 67, and 68] :

EUCALYPTUS ACMENOIDES (Schauer).—New South
Wales and East Queensland. The wood used in
the same way as that of E. obliqua (the stringy-bark
tree), butsuperior toit. Itis heavy, strong, durable,
of a light color, and has been found good for palings,
flooring-boards, battens, rails, and many other pur-
poses of house carpentry. (Rev. Dr.’ Woolls.)

EUCALYPTUS BOTRYOIDES (Smith). — From East
Gipps Land to South Queensland. One of the most
stately among an extensive number of species, re-
EUCALYPTUS TREES, 85

markable for its dark green shady foliage. It delights
on river banks. Stems attain a length of eighty feet
without a branch, and a diameter of eight feet. The
timber usually sound to the centre, adapted for water
work, wagons, knees of boats, etc. Posts of it very
lasting, as no decay was observed in fourteen years.

EUCALYPTUS BRACHYPODA (Turezaninow).— Wide-
ly dispersed over the most arid extra-tropical as well
as tropical inland regions of Australia. One of the
best trees for desert tracts; in favorable places one
hundred and fifty feet high. Wood brown, some-
times very dark, hard, heavy, and elastic, prettily
marked ; thus used for cabinet work, but more particu-
larly for piles, bridges, and railway-sleepers. (Rey.
Dr. Woolls.)

EUCALYPTUS CALOPHYLLA ( Brown). —South-
west Australia. More umbrageous than most Eu-
calypts, and of comparatively rapid growth. The
wood is free of resin when grown on alluvial land-
but not so when produced on stony ranges. It is pre-
ferred to that of E. marginata and £. cornuta for
rafters, spokes, and fence-rails ; it is strong and light
but not long lasting underground. The bark is valua-
ble for tanning, as an admixture to Acacia bark.

EvcaLyPTus CoRNUTA (Labillardiere). — South-
west Australia. A large tree, of rapid growth, pre-
ferring asomewhat humid soil. The wood is used for
various artisans’ work, and there preferred for the
strongest shafts and frames of carts, and other work
requiring hardness, toughness, and elasticity.

EUCALYPTUS CREBRA (F. v. Mueller).—The narrow-
leaved iron-bark tree of New South Wales and Queens.
land. Wood reddish, hard, heavy, elastic, and dura-
36 FOREST CULTURE AND

ble; much used in the construction of bridges; also,
of wagons, piles, fencing, etc. . melanophioia (F. v.
M.), the silver-leaved iron-bark tree, and Z. leptoph-
leba, E. trachyphioia and E. drepanphylia are closely
allied species of similar value. They all exude as-
tringent gum-resin in considerable quantity, resem-
bling kino in appearance and property.

EUCALYPTUS DORATOXYLON (F. v. Mueller).— The
spear-wood of South-west Australia, where it occurs
in sterile districts, The stem is slender and remark-
ably straight, and the wood of such firmness and elas-
ticity that the nomadic natives wandér long distances
to obtain it as material for their spears.

EUCALYPTUS EUGENIOIDES (Sieber).—New South
Wales. Regarded by the Rev. Dr. Woolls as a fully
distinct species. Itssplendid wood, there, often call-
ed Blue Gum-tree wood, available for many purposes,
and largely utilized for ship-building.

EvcALYPTUS GUNNII (J. Hooker).—Victoria, Tas-
mania and New South Wales, at alpine and subalpine
elevations, The other more hardy Eucalyptis com-
prise £. coriacea, E. alpina, E. urnigera, E. coccifera,
and £. vernicosa, which all reach heights covered
with snow for several months in the year.

EUCALYPTUS PANICULATA (Smith). —The White
Iron-bark tree of New South Wales. All the trees
of this series are deserving of cultivation, as their
wood, though always excellent, is far from alike, and
that of each species preferred for special purposes of
the artisans.

EUCALYPTUS PHCNICEA, (F. v. Muller).—Carpen-
taria and Arnheim’s Land. Of the quality of the tim-
ber hardly- anything is known, but the brilliancy of
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 37

its scarlet flowers recommends this species to a place
inany forest or garden plantation. For the same rea-
son, also, E. miniata, from North Australia, and EZ,
Jicifolia, from South-west Australia, should be brought
extensively under cultivation.

EUCALYPTUS PILULARIS (Smith).—The Black-butt
tree of South Queensland, New South Wales, and
Gipps Land. One of the best timber-yielding trees
about Sydney; of rather rapid growth (Rev. Dr.
Woolls). It is much used for flooring-boards.

EUCALYPTUS PLATYPHYLLA (F. v. Mueller.)—
Queensland. Regarded by the Rev. Julian Tenison
Woods as one of the best of shade-trees, and seen to
produce leaves sometimes one and one half feet long,
and one foot wide. This tree is available for open,
exposed localities, where trees from deep forest valleys
would not thrive.

EUCALYPTUS ROBUSTA (Smith).—New South
Wales. The timber in use for ship-building, wheel-
wright’s work, and marry implements, such as mal-
lets, ete.

EUCALYPTUS RESINIFERA (Smith ).—The Red
Mahogany Eucalypt of South Queensland and New
South Wales. A superior timber - tree, according to
the Rev. Dr. Woolls, the wood being much prized
for its strength and durability.

EUCALYPTUS SIDEROPHLOIA ( Bentham ). — The
large-leaved or red Iron-bark tree of New South Wales
and South Queensland. According to the Rev. Dr.
Woolls, this furnishes one of the strongest and most
durable timbers of New South Wales; with. great
advantage used for railway sleepers, and for many
building purposes. It is harder even than the wood

3¥
88 FOREST CULTURE.

of £. sideroxylon, but thus also worked with more diffi-
culty:

EUCALYPTUS TERETICORNS (Smith).—From East
Queensland to Gipps Land. Closely allied to %. ros-
trata and seemingly not inferior to it in value.

EUCALYPTUS TESSELARIS (F. v. Mueller). —N.
Australia and Queensland. Furnishes a brown,
rather elastic wood, not very hard, available for
many kinds of artisan’s work, and particularly sought
for staves and flooring. The tree exudes much
astringent gum resin (P. O’Shanesy). Many other
Eucalypts could have been mentioned as desirable for
wood culture, but it would have extended this enu-
meration beyond the limits assigned to it. Moreover,

‘the quality of many kinds is not yet sufficiently as-
certained, or not yet fully appreciated even by the
artisans and woodmen.
PLANT CATALOGUE,

ANDERSON, HALL & CO., SYDNEY.

 

N. 8S. WALES HARDWOOD TIMBER-TREES,

 

In many respects, no timbers in the world can com-
pare with those of Australia, For all purposes requir-
ing great strength, combined with great durability,
they are unapproached. Those of New South Wales
have, as arule, a reputation in those respects superior
to those of similar species in the other Australian colo-
nies, This superiority has been noticed more par-
ticularly in tougher and closer - packed tissues. So
much is this the case that, for some particular pur-
poses, such timber as Iron-bark and Blue Gum have
to be obtained from New South Wales for use in
Victoria, although both species are common there.
Among other peculiarly valuable properties possessed
by our timbers, for such purposes as bridges, jetties,
or any other buildings where strong timber may be
used, not the least is the valuable quality of difficult
ignition and lack of inflammability.

Of late years these woods, and the forests which
produce them, have attracted a great deal of attention
jn Europe, not only for the qualities of the timber,
but for other properties, which are being from time
to time discovered by science, and promising extraor-:
dinary riches in both medicine and the arts,
40 FOREST CULTURE AND

Asa fuel, both for domestic and industrial purposes,
the wood, natural and carbonized, of some species, is
superior to most others, and, for steam purposes, some,
as Iron-bark and Box, are only inferior to coal.

Possessing so many valuable qualities, combined
with the fact that these trees are found growing, in
New South Wales, in boundless forests, under extremes
of climate, both as to heat and cold — ranging from
one hundred and thirty to twenty-five degrees Fah-
renheit—it may be inferred that forests of them will
some day be planted in many other parts of the world.

The following list comprises the principal species :

1. WHITE GuM (Eucalyptus hemastoma).—Yields
gum resin largely, is not remarkable for its timber,
but is a good domestic fuel. Height, fifty to one hun-
dred feet.

2. RIVER WHITE Gum (£. radiata),.—A fair-last-
ing timber for rough fencing; difficult to burn; a bad
fuel. One hundred feet.

3. BLUE GUM, COMMON PARRAMATTA (£. rostrata,
B.)—Used in ship-building for knees, beams, and some
kinds of planking. A very durable wood ; will last
well as posts in the ground ; inferior fuel. One hun-
dred and twenty feet.

4, FLOODED BLUE Gum (£. eugenotdes).— The best
timber for ship-building (planking in particular) ; very
durable. One of the best timbers for many purposes ;
inferior fuel. One hundred and eighty feet.

5. GREY GuM oR RED GuM (E. tereticornis). — A
very strong, durable, hard wood, almost equal to Iron-
bark for some.purposes ; lasts.in the ground ; inferior
fuel. One hundred and fifty feet.
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 41

6. DRooPpine Gum (£. saligna). — A medium tim-
ber ; inferior fuel. One hundred feet.

7. BLUE GUM LIKE THE FLOODED Gum (£. gont-
calyx), Used in ship-building ; is the best wood for
felloes in wheels; very durable; inferior fuel. One
hundred and fifty feet.

8. SpoTrED GuM (E. maculata). — A very strong,
light, and elastic timber, very durable as girders or
beams ; the best wood for staves, and useful for sawn
timber in household carpentry ; first-class fuel for
domestic use. One hundred and twenty feet.

9, DARK OR BROAD-LEAVED IRON-BARK (E£, side-
rophioia).—The most valuable wood for piles, girders,
railway-sleepers, and for every purpose in which.
strength and durability are required ; even shingles
of ane fourth inch thickness have been known to last
sound on roofs for forty years, This species and the
two following are the strongest of all Australian tim-
bers, and are used for a greater number of purposes—
spokes, shafts, poles, frames, by wheelwrights; the
best telegraph-posts, fencing of all kinds, and none
are equal to it for cogs in mill-work. It is superior
to most as fuel for steam-engines, as it throws off
more heat, ete., etc. One hundred and fifty feet.

10. COMMON IRON-BARK (£. paniculata). —For most
purposes equal to the last species; is less inlocked and
is more easily split into shingles or palings; it is as last-
ing and as good fuel as other Iron-barks; the wood is
not so dark in color. One hundred and twenty feet.

11, SMALL-LEAVED OR SHE IRON-BARK (£2. micro-
phyla) (?).—The wood of this species is used for fenc-
ing and many purposes the same as the’ other Iron-
barks. But the wood being of a nature much more
42, FOREST CULTURE AND

easy to werk, it may be used in carpentry in many
ways, to which the hardness of the other sorts offers
an obstacle; first-class fuel. One hundred and twenty
feet.

12, STRINGY-BARK (E. obliqua).— The best wood
for flooring-boards, rafters, and sawn stuff generally ;
it is of very thick growth, inferior fuel, but produces
the best charcoal for the forge. One hundred and
twenty feet.

13. BLACK-BUTT(E. pilularis).— Wood like Stringy-
bark, and used for similar purposes. Small spars of
this species are used for shipping. It is almost the
only Eucalyptus thatis used for this purpose; inferior
fuel. One hundred and fifty to two hundred feet.

14. YELLOW BLACK-BUTT (Z. obtusijflora).—Timber
like the preceding, but softer and more easily work-
ed, and of a yellow tint. It is a remarkably quick
grower. One hundred and fifty feet.

15. CoMMon Box (&. hemiphloia).—A hard but use-
ful timber, strong, tough, and durable, but will not
last as posts or piles sunk in the ground. It is, also,
a first-class fuel both for domestic use and for steam
or other industrial purposes. One hundred to one
hundred and fifty feet.

16. MESSMATE, OR ALMOND-LEAVED STRINGY-
BARK (£. amygdalina).—A first-class timber for floor-
ing-boards, joists, and- other house-carpentry. It is
like Stringy-bark, but the tree is an ace larger, and it
is not so generally distributed. It is a bad wood for
domestic fuel, but is a first-rate smiths’ charcoal.
One hundred. and fifty to two hundred feet.

_ 17. Buack Box (£, bicolor).—A highly valued tim-
ber - tree; it is equal to the best Iron - bark for all the
EUCALYPTUS TREES, 43

purposes for which that wood is’ used, and is more
easily wrought. It is sometimes called ‘Iron - bark
Box.’’ One hundred to one hundred and fifty feet.

18. WOOLLEYBUTT (£. longifolia). — An average-
sized tree. Fair timber for fencing and building pur-
poses; it is a good fuel for domestic use; very dura-
ble, and is said to be less liable to the attack of the
white. ant than any other of the Eucalypti. One hun-
dred to one hundred and twenty feet.

19. BLoopwoop (£. corymbosa). — A very large
tree. Timber first-class for posts, piles, and such like;
it is extremely durable in the ground. It is nota
favorite as sawn timber, on account of its many gum
veins; not a good fuel. One hundred and fifty to
two hundred feet.

20. Swamp Mawoeany (£. robusta)—A good last-
ing timber for house-carpentry and many kinds of
turnery. It is not durable in the ground, but for other
purposes it is very durable, and is nota favorite with
the white ant. It is not remarkable as a burning
wood. Its specific gravity is great. One hundred
and fifty feet.

EUCALYPTUS GLOBULUS (Tasmania Blue Gum).—
In the once despised Gum-tree (Zucalyptus). it has
been discovered that qualities exist which place it
transcendently above any other plants, if not above
al other plants, in hygienic importance.

By its means large tracts of the very richest land
will be made available in many parts of the world.
In India, and other parts of Southern Asia, vast areas
are left without culture or occupation, overrun with
jungle and forest, and totally unfit for man’s abode
on account of their malarja-producing character. Al.
44 FOREST CULTURE,

ready has the malaria-destroying exhalations of Eu-
calyptus globulus been practically proved beyond a
doubt in Europe, Africa, and America. It is confi-
dently stated that in the fatal Roman Pontine Marshes,
and the no less fatal swamps of Lombardy and other
parts of Italy, the Kucalyptus globulus has rendered
healthy, localities in which to sleep a single night
was all but certain death.

In America, the Gum-tree is being most extensive-
ly planted, with the view of making uninhabitable
districts healthy. In fact, so ample are the proofs of
its efficacy that millions of malarious acres in all parts
of the globe where the climate suits it will, within a
very few years, be planted with ‘Blue Gum.”

Eucalyptus globulus has already become noted in all
temperate climes as ‘‘ The Fever-tree,” and certain
it is that it truly deserves the name. Doubtless other
species of Hucalyptus possess the same beneficial prop-
erty, but globulus is the only one which has yet been
so abundantly tested by practical trial.

It is the easiest of the tribe to rear, and develops
from the seedling into the tree with great rapidity.-
So great has become the demand from Europe and
America for seed that the forests of Tasmania are
threatened with annihilation. To give our friends
some idea of the demand, we sold have nearly half a
ton of seed during the past year. One pound weight
should produce many thousands of plants; this will
give some estimate of the enormous number of trees
that must now be planted all over the world,
FOREST CULTURE

IN ITS

RELATIONS TO INDUSTRIAL PURSUITS:

A DECTURE:E,

‘
DELIVERED BY

Baron Ferd, von Mueller, C.M.G., M.D., Ph.D., F.R.S,

(Government Botanist for Victoria, and Director of the Botanic Gardens of
Melbourne),

On the 22d of June, 1871.

“ The toils of science swell the wealth of art.""
BuLwER Lytton, from Schiller.

Strange as it may appear, an impression seems to
be prevailing in these communities that our forests
have to serve no other purposes but to provide wood
for our immediate and present wants, be it fuel or
timber. For even after the warning of climatic
changes, and after the commencing scarcity of wood,
no forest administration, at least none adequate or
regularly organized, has been initiated in any portion
of Australia ; and thus the forests, even in districts
already very populous, remain almost unguarded,
become extensively reduced, and in some localities
are already annihilated ; indeed, the requirements of
the current time alone are kept in view. Under such
circumstances it cannot be surprising that neither an
46 FOREST CULTURE AND

universal forest supervision, nor a judicious restraint
of consumption, nor an ample utilization of all the
various collateral resources of our woodlands, received
that serious attention to which such measures became
more and more entitled.

During the earlier years of our colonization, while
the population was but thinly scattered over the ter-
ritory, or densely concentrated in a few places only,
all demands on the wood resources were comparatively
so limited as to cause, perhaps, nowhere vast destruc-
tion of the timber vegetation, much less any alarm
for meeting the requirements of the future. Then
followed the first gold period, with all its bustle, tur-
moils and agitations, preventing reflection on almost
anything except the immediate wants of that stormy
time. Subsequently, when the commotion and ex-
citement of the earlier gold era had calmed down,
other obstacles arose, which, in their conflicts, brought
rouch sadness on this young country, and retarded
for years its full progress. But now, when apparent-
ly also these difficulties have been surmounted, it will
be all the more incumbent on our statesmen and legis-
lators to exclude no longer from their consideration
and watchfulness that remaining portion of a bequest
which bountiful Nature, in its rich woods, has in-
trusted to our care, The maintenance of these forest
riches should engage not only the loftiest forethought,
but also a well-guided and scrupulous vigilance.

How forests beneficially affect a clime, how they
supply equable humidity, how they afford extensive
shelter, create springs, and control the flow of rivers—
all this the teachings of science, the records of history,
and more forcibly still, the sufferings or even ruin of
EUCALYPTUS TREES, 47

numerous and vast communities, have demonstrated
in sad experiences, not only in times long past, but
even in very recent periods. In what manner the
forests arrest passing miasmata, or set a limit to the
spreading of rust-spores from ruined cornfields; in
what manner their humid atmosphere and their feath-
ered singers effectually obstruct the march of armies
of locusts in the Orient, or hinder the progress of vast
masses of acrydia in North America, or oppose the
wanderings of other insects elsewhere — all this has
been clearly witnessed in our own age. How the for-
ests, as slow conductors of heat, lessen the tempera-
ture of warm climes, or banish siroccos ; how forests,
as ready conductors of electricity, much influence and
attract the current of the vapors, or impede the elas-
tic flow of the air, with its storms and its humidity,
far above the actual height of the trees, and how they
condense the moisture of the clouds by lowering the
temperature of the atmosphere, has over and over
again been ascertained by many a thoughtful observer.
In what mode forests shelter the soil from solar heat,
and produce coolness through radiation from the end-
lessly-multiplied surfaces of their leaves, and through
the process of exhalations; how, in the spongy stra-
tum of decaying vegetable remnants, they retain far
more humidity than even cultivated soil; how they
with avidity re-absorb the surplus of moisture from
the air, and refresh by a never-wanting dew all vege.
tation within them and in their vicinity, has been
explained, not only by natural philosophy, but also
often by observations of the plainest kind. How for-
est-trees, by the powerful penetration of their roots,
decompose the rocks, and force unceasingly from deep
48 FOREST CULTURE AND

strata the mineral elements of vegetable nutrition to
the surface ; how they create and maintain the sources
for the gentle flow of watercourses for motive power,
aqueducts, irrigation, water - traffic and navigation ;
how they mitigate or prevent malarious influences —
of all this we become cognizant by daily experiences
almost everywhere around us. We have to look,
‘therefore, far beyond a mere temporary wood supply,
when we wish to estimate the blessings of forest vege-
tation rightly ; and our mind has to grasp the com-
plex causes and sequences originating with and de-
pending on the forests, before their value as a total
can be understood.

“ Here, in the sultriest season, let us rest !
Fresh is the green beneath those aged trees ;
Here air of gentlest wing will fan our breast—
From heaven itself we may inhale the breeze.”
Byron.

Let us then take timely warning ; let us remember
that denuded earth parts with its warmth by radiation,
and is intensely heated by insulation ; that thus in
woodless countries the extremes of climate are brought
about in rendering the Winter-cold far more intense
and boisterous, and the Summer-heat far more burning
and oppressive. Let us remember why the absence
or destruction of forests involves periodic floods and
droughts, with all the great disasters inseparable
therefrom. Let us bear in mind that even in bur
praised Australia many a pastoral tenant saw his herds
and flocks perish, and even the very kangaroos off his
run; how he looked hopefully for months and months
at every promising cloud which drew up on the hori-
zon, only to dissolve rainless in the dry desert air;
whereas, when the squatter’s ruin was completed,
BUCALYPTUS TREES. 49

the last pasture parched, and the last waterpool dried
up, great atmospheric changes would send the rain-
clouds over the thirsty land with all the vehemence
of precipitation, and would convert dry creeks into
foaming torrents, or inundate with furious floods the
very pastures over which the carcasses of the famished
cattle and sheep were strewn about! Picture to your-
selves the ruined occupant of the soil, hardly able
to escape with his bare life from the sudden scenes of
these tragic disasters! Fortunately, as yet such ex-
treme events may not have happened commonly ; yet
they did occur, and pronounced their lessons impress-
ively. Let it be well considered that it is not alone
the injudicious overstocking of many a pasture, or
the want of water-storage, but frequently the very
want of rain itself for years in extensive woodless
districts, which renders occupation of many of our
inland tracts so precarious. Let it also not be forgot-
ten how, without a due proportion of woodland, no
country can be great and prosperous! Remember
how whole mountain districts of Southern Europe be-
came, with the fall of the forests, utterly depopulated;
how the gushes of wide currents washed away all ara~
ble soil, while the bordering flat land became buried
in debris ; how its rivers became filled with sediment,
while the population of the lowland were at the same
time involved in poverty and ruin! Let us recollect
that in many places the remaining alpine inhabitant
had to toil with his very fuel for many miles up to the
once wooded hills, where barrenness and bleakness
would perhaps no longer allow a tree to vegetate ! It
should be borne in mind that the productiveness of
cereal fields is often increased at the rate of fully fifty
50 FOREST CULTURE AND

per cent. merely by establishing plantations of shelter-
trees ; that the progress of drift-sand is checked by
tree-plantations ; and that a belt of timber not only
affords protection against storms, but also converts
sandy wastes finally into arable meadows, thus adding
almost unobserved, yet unceasingly, so far to the re-
sources of a country.

Shall we follow, then, the example of those improvi-
dent populations who, by clearing of forests, dimin-
ished most unduly the annual fall of rain, or pre-
vented its retention ; who caused a dearth of timber
and fuel, by which not solely the operations of their
artisans became already hindered or even paralyzed,
but through which even many a flourishing country
tract was already converted almost into a desert
Should we not rather commence to convert any desert
tract into a smiling country, by thinking early and
unselfishly of the requirements of those who are to
follow us? Why not rather imitate the example set
by an Egyptian sovereign, who alone caused, during
the earlier part of this century, 20,000,000 of trees
to be planted in formerly rainless parts of his domin-
ions.

Dr. H. Rogers, of Mauritius, issued, this year, a re-
port ‘‘on the effects of the cutting-down of forests on
the climate and health of Mauritius.” Still, in 1854,.
the island was resorted to by: invalids from India as
the ‘‘pearl’’ of the Indian Ocean, it being then one
mass of verdure. When the forests were cleared,
to gain space for sugar cultivation, the rainfall dimin-
ished even there ; the rivers dwindled down to mud-
dy streams; the water became stagnant in cracks,
revices, and natural hollows, while the equable tem-
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 61

perature of the island entirely changed ; even drought
was experienced in the midst of the ocean, and thun-
der-showers were rarely any longer witnessed. The
lagoons, rnarshes, and swamps along the seaboard
were no longer filled with water, but gave off nox-
ious gases; while the river- waters became impure
from various refuse. After a violent inundation, in
February, 1865, followed by a period of complete dry-
ness, fever, of a low type, set in, against which the
remedies employed in ordinary febrile cases proved
utterly valueless. From the waterless sides of the
lagoons, pestilential malaria arose, exposed to which
the laborers fell on the field, and, in some instances,
died within a few hours afterward. But scarcity of
good food among the destitute classes, and inadequate
sewagegarrangement, predisposed also to the dread-
ful effect of the fever, atthe time. As stated by my-
self, on a former public occasion, marshes should
either be fully drained or the means of continuing
them submerged should not be withdrawn. Dr.
Rogers very properly insists that the plateaux and
highlands of Mauritius must be replanted, alone
on sanitary reasons. The small island of Malta re-
quires, at this moment, to make strenuous effort for
wood culture, to render tillage further possible and
the clime more tolerable. The once forest-covered
hills, which bordered the rich garden country of Mur-
cia, in Moorish times, are now masses of arid rocks ;
while Spain, nowadays, is even helpless to obtain its
very fuel, and thus all its technologic industries must
languish. No wonder, then, if our here much-disre-
garded Eucalypts are called there the trees of the
future.
52 FOREST CULTURE AND

But I have, on this occasion, dwelt already long
enough on the stern necessity of securing a due rela-
_tion of forest to territory, of woods to climate, of tim-
ber to industries. These great questions have been
discussed, by able men, through time long passed, in
all countries of civilization. The details, moreover,
of such discussions demand a special and fuller teach-
ing, for which, perhaps, opportunities may yet arise
in this hall. But to those who wish early to devote
fuller attention to vital considerations of this kind, I
would recommend the perusal of the admirable work
of George P. Marsh (Man and Nature; or Physical
Geography, as modified by Human Action. London:
1864). That author studied the scattered and largely
foreign literature pertaining to this subject with sin-
gular care, observed very many original fagts, and
argued on them with great ability. A smaller, still
more recent publication (Disastrous Effects of the De-
struction of Forest Trees in Wisconsin, by Lapham,
Knapp, and Crocker, published in 1867) is also de-
serving full attention, inasmuch as it brings before us
the difficulties and losses which the destruction of the
forests has already caused in one of the younger of the
American States ; while, again, Indian experiences
in regard to forests may be traced in the valuable vol-
ume issued by Dr. Cleghern (Forests of the Punjab and
Western Himalaya ; Roor Kee, 1864). Some observa-
tions of my own, applying to countries like North Af-
rica, have been recorded two years ago in the Bulle.
tin de la Societe d’ Agriculture d’ Alger.
One of the main objects, however, of my address
this evening, is to show in what manner a well-or-
ganized and yet inexpensive system of forest admin-
EUCALYPTUS TREES, 53

istration might check the indiscriminate destruction
of the woods, without, perhaps, lessening the rate of
the present yield ; in what manner numerous latent
industrial resources of our ranges might be speedily
and successfully developed, and a higher revenue thus
be raised by the state ; in what manner this increased
income could be best employed, to maintain orenrich
the forests, or to raise woods where naturally none
existed ; and by what new means prosperous occupa-
tion might be afforded to many a happy family in the
still and salubrious sylvan recesses of this country.
And here I would at once remark, that for any ad<
ministrative organization to watch over our forest
interests we must follow an independent path of our
own in this young country, because the systems of |
forest management adopted with so much advantage
in Germany, France, and Scandinavia are here appli-
cable only to a very limited extent. This must be at
once apparent to any one who will reflect on the dis-
parity which exists between our clime, our native
tree vegetation, our present ratio of population and
value of labor, as compared with similar conditions of
the older and far more densely inhabited countries of
middle and northern Europe, not to speak of the very
much wider scope which, for the selection of trees for
our future use, the isothermal zone of Victoria allows.
On the latter subject our Acclimatization Society has
recently published the views which I entertain in ref-
erence to the many various trees eligible for the geo-
graphic latitudes of a colony like ours.* Next I pro-
ceed to give, though very briefly, only an outline of
the special system of administration, which I would

 

* Appendix to the Annual Report of the Vict. Acclimat. Soc., 1870-71,
4
54 FOREST CULTURE AND

advise to be adopted ‘in the first instance, as well for
the supervision, enrichment, and utilization of our
native forests as fur creating als) new ones. On vari-
ous occasions I have alluded to such a plan of surveil-
lance before. More recently, though only passingly,
in a lecture delivéred at this hall, I advocated the
formation of local Forest Boards in the different dis-
tricts of our colonial territory. Various considera-
tions led me to recommend this system. The admin-
istration, as an honorary one, would involve no direct
expenditure to the State. It would bring to bear in
each locality special watchfulness and local talent.
In each district could readily be found a few inhabit-
ants who not only possess some knowledge of tree-
culture in general, but who, also, by their direct in-
terest in the present and future welfare of the locality
in which they live, in which they gained experiences,
in which they hold property, and in which they rear-
ed a family, would be induced, as much for the sake
of direct and lasting advantages as from patriotic
motives, to devote the needful time for serving on a
local Forest Board. But there are still other weighty
advantages, which claim support for this proposition.
Various tracts of the Victorian territory are—as might
be imagined — very unlike in climate and geologic
structure. Each locality shows peculiar adaptabilities
for special trees to be selected. One district can afford,
by the possession of more extensive primeval forests,
to be far more heavily taxed in its timber resources
than another ; one tract of country can produce remu-
neratively certain trees, which it would be hopeless
to attempt raising in another locality. Some exten-
sive areas have no forests at all, and in others they.
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 55

have all but succumbed already. Hence each Forest
Board can best frame its own by-laws or local regula-
tions, subject to the approval of ministerial authority ;
each can best judge of its own particular requirements,
not only for the present generation, but also of such
as will be urgent at atime when the children and
grand-children of the earlier colonists will have to
form their judgment on the wisdom or shortcomings
of their ancestors here at a time when the want of
foresight may fall most crushingly on the vitality or
progress of many an industry or even the whole pros-
perity of the colony, or when, otherwise, the early
operations of thoughtful local residents will prove to
osterity an incalculable benefit. It will then become
apparent whether the present colonists have done
their duty to their descendants, and havebeen faith-
ful to the future interests of their adopted country ;
or whether they sunk all their ideas and efforts in
temporary gain, regardless of all consequences. Each
forest district, thus guarded by local administrators,
will be able to produce a far larger income than now
is raised from any of our wood areas; while the re-
moval of timber will be brought within more reason-
able bounds, and the wants of the future no longer be
disregarded. Means of disposal of the wood, differ-
ent to the regulations now in force, would be adopted,
to save, in places much denuded already of wood, the
rest of the timber from complete destruction. Thus,
for instance, trees might be sold by numbers at cer-
tain sizes, with saving of the youthful trees; or the
wood might be removed by the square mile, with a
view of replanting. The reckless ringing of trees
(merely to obtain a little more grass) and stripping of
56 FOREST CULTURE AND

bark would be brought within stringent laws, and
many other losses be obviated.

A gentleman at Hillesley counts, as late as this
‘very month, five splendid trees on an acre, cut down
by the splitters, while only about one tenth of the
wood is used; nine tenths being left to be swept away,
sooner or later, by bush-fires. This improvidence goes
on within a few hours’ drive from Melbourne. The
stately sea -coast Banksias (Banksia integrifolia), so
rare near Melbourne, and hardly occurring further
westward, have been nearly exterminated within this
month, as near to us as Brighton. On all this, local
forest surveillance can form far the best opinion.
Each Board should have its cultivator, who, simul-
taneously, could perform the duties of forest-ranger.
A few unprovided orphan boys might be occupied in
the simple nursery or planting work for the forests.
The officer intrusted with forest duties on behalf of
the Government might aid, by frequent visits to each
forest district, the various Boards with much advice.
The expenditure for such an organization in each
instance would be most moderate, would be product-
ive already of early remunerative gain, and cause
large and immediate savings. No statesman, I feel
assured, would wish to impoverish our woods at the
expense of the next generation, just as little as any
legislator would hesitate to re-vote annually, for each
forest administration, at least a portion of the revenue
raised from the woods under its control. A sound
economy of the State will not expect from a forest in,
populous localities any more than to devote its means
for self-support. One of the first duties devolving on
any forest department would undoubtedly be to cause
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 57

in each district some fertile, sheltered valleys, readily
accessible to good lines of traffic, to be selected, where,
from springs or rivulets, water could be obtained for
inexpensive irrigation, in order to reserve such spots
for forest nurseries before they are all alienated from
the Crown. The transit of the millions of seedlings
needed for forest plantations, from remote spots, would
not only be one of enormous and unnecessary expend-
iture, but, in the many instances of evergreen and
even some deciduous trees, it would be next to impos-
sible to convey living plants for long distances. The
union of Forest Boards to Road Boards or Shire Coun-
cils I regard inadvisable, because their scope of action
is so different. The predilections of a member of a
municipality will often be in building operations and
kindred objects, while for culture processes he may
have neither inclination nor experience, It is never
_wise to burden too heavy responsibilities on a few
honorary administrators, whose leisure in this youth-
ful country, where so much work is yet under the
first or early process of creating, is almost sure to be
but limited.

But there are instances in which—as, indeed, a
thoughtful legislator has suggested —the Mining
Boards might exercise, in their vicinity, supervision
also over the woods. On many professional ques-
tions, such as the renovation of forests, the best util-
ization of their products, the increase of their riches,
I would, myself, very gladly afford advice, and thus
maintain a consulting position to the Forest Boards ;
for, need I add, it has ever been my aim to serve, as
far as it was within my means, the best interests of
my fellow-colonists ; and while official responsibility
58 FOREST CULTURE AND

rests on me in this direction, I would wish to meet it
in such a way that those who will live after us shall
never be able to tax me with blindness to any impor-
tant interest of our colony, so far as such were intrust-
ed to my charge. But, then, the views of a profes-
sional officer should be received with that considera-
tion, and be seconded with that support, to which
they have fair claim.

I pass the subject of the incalculable value of the
native woods, such as we still possess in our own for-
ests, whether viewed in their relation to arts or as
mercantile export commodities. It isa matter far
too large to dwellon, even cursorily, on this occasion.
Were I to enumerate all the uses already practically
known of our native trees, I would have to compile
a goodly volume, even were I silent on the still far
ampler subject of the introduction of the thousands
of different foreign trees which I should like to see
here for the use of future artisans and those who are
to benefit by their services. A work bearing on the
nature of the forest- trees of India, by Dr. Balfour,
was kindly placed in my hands by Col. Sankey, whose
stay among us we at present (22d June, 1871) enjoy
for advice.on our water-works. Major Beddome, of
Madras, issues a kindred illustrated work.

I may, however, be allowed to point to the enor-
mous consumption of indigenous wood in some locali-
ties, a3 this expenditure is utterly out of all proportion

-to the existing supply or its present natural renova-
tion. This question presents itself all the more grave-
ly, as no rich coal-seams are as yet discovered, by
which the fuel-supply could be augmented from short
distances, at a moderate price, We haye also to be
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 59

cognizant that we cannot think of coal-fields as inex-
haustible, even in the richest coal countries ; and,
although it is to be hoped that the day is very distant
when the cheap results of colliery work will be marred
by the much- increasing depth of the coal mines,
or their partial exhaustion, yet we cannot altogether
discard the idea that, so far as coals are concerned,
we are working ona capital, however large it may
be, without ever adding to it. In Victoria, we can
neither augment the supply of burning material by
peat, such as is so extensively utilized for fuel in the
countries of the North, except we bring a very similar
and equally useful peat from the distant and rug-
ged heights of our Alpine mountains.

Although science has promised us prophetically
other sources for applied heat—and I may add, motive
power — in gases not yet within our technic reach
or of universal application, we have, nevertheless, to
deal with the stern realities of the day until new sci-
entific achievements in this direction shall have been
accomplished. At best, and looking ever so hopefully
forward to the successes of the future, we cannot sub-
stitute in an endless array of purposes air or coal for
the ever-wanted living wood, even if all that concerns
climate and health could be left out of our contempla-
tion. As an instance, then, of our present consump-
tion, or almost immediate requirements of wood, I
would like to quote one or two examples.

The able Engineer - in- chief of the Railway De-
partment —T. Higinbotham, Esq. —has obligingly
supplied me with the following data in reference to
the timber at present consumed for the Government
railway lines, This gentleman explains also what will
60 FOREST CULTURE AND

most likely be needed within the next few years for
this purpose.

‘«The number of sleepers which are used annually
on the existing lines of railway, to replace decayed
sleepers, is about forty thousand; and there can be no
doubt that renewals at this rate at least must be con-
tinued for many years to come. Each sleeper con-
tains three and one eighth cubic feet of timber, and
for renewals Red Gum timber is used exclusively, the
principal supplies being obtained from the Murray
River.

«‘The length of fencing, which is renewed annually
on the existing lines, may be taken at eighteen miles,
and the quantity of timber in a mile of fencing is about
three thousand cubic feet ; the timber used in renew-

‘ing fencing is Messmate, Peppermint, and Stringy-
bark, and the durability of these timbers when used
for fencing may be taken at ten years.

‘There are at present nearly one hundred and

‘twenty miles of new railway in course of construction,
and sixty miles more will be undertaken before the
close of this year. The new line of railway, the
North-eastern, will be one hundred and eighty-one
miles long, and for each mile two thousand sleepers
are required, which at three and one-eighth cubic feet
per sleeper gives six thousand two hundred and fifty
cubic feet per mile ; or, for the whole length of one
hundred and eighty-one miles, one million one hundred
and thirty-one thousand two hundred and fifty cubic
feet will be required for sleepers. The timber to be
used in these sleepers will be Red Gum, Iron-bark, or
Box. I have no actual experience of the durability
of these timbers when used for sleepers ; but I believe
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 61

that it will be quite safe to reckon on their lasting for
eighteen years. The ordinary Gums, when used for
sleepers, will not last more than half that time.

‘¢The quantity of timber required for fencing the
North-eastern railway will be one million eighty-six
thousand cubic feet. The fence-posts will be of Red
Gum, Iron-bark, Blue Gum, or Box, and the rails of
Stringy-bark. I think that a fence of these materials
will last for eighteen years. As to projected railways,
it seems to be probable that on the average from thir-
ty to forty miles will be made for the next ten years,
in addition to the North-eastern railway already in
progress. ’’

Iam further told, by a gentleman conversant with
our railway affairs, that the engines on the present
Government line use about three thousand tons of
wood a year, while about eight hundred tons more’
are consumed on the stations. The Government line
requires one hundred and fifty thousand Blackwood
keys annually. On inquiry, I havealso learned that
the breakwater at Williamstown will take four hun-
dred piles, equal to eighteen thousand cubic feet, and
for the superstructure of the piers ten thousand cubic
feet more. The Melbourne Gas-works required, in
1870, not less than forty thousand superficial feet of
Red Gum timber. The quantity of Red Gum wood
required for these and other purposes cannot be in-
creased by supplies from Tasmania, as the tree does
not exist there. Again: the true Blue Gum-tree
does not naturally occur beyond Victoria and Tasma-
nia. If complete wood statistics could be collected,
both of our daily requirements in town, on land, and
on sea, and statistics also as to what really sound and

4
62 FOREST CULTURE AND

straight timber is still available, some serious realities
would be brought before us. z

At Ballarat, Creswick, Beechworth, Yackandandah,
Sandhurst, Heathcote, Maryborough, Avoca, Castle-
maine, Fryer’s Creek, and Ararat, some of the tim-
ber for the mines has to be brought already from dis-
tances as remote as ten fo sixteen miles, according to
returns of the Mining Surveyor, kindly furnished by
Mr. R. Brough Smyth. At Pleasant Creek the min-
ers have to go every year a mile further for their
wood.

I quote the following important statement from Mr.
R. B. Smyth’s Mineral Statistics of Victoria for 1870 :

Table showing approximately the Quantity and Cost of Timber
consumed annually for Mining Purposes in the several Mining
Districts, from returns made by the Mining Surveyors and

   
    

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

  

Registrars.
{ Firewood, etc. .......... 320,601 tons. £ 8. ad.
| Props and cap-pieces....1,650,555 pcs.
BALLARAT cones 3 | Laths and slabs.........4,274,798 pes, f 908,024 4 7
Sawn timber.... . 5,772,110 feet.
A ( Firewood, etc. ...... 45,600 tons. ")}
Props and cap-pieces. . 155,778 pcs.
BEECHWORTH... 4 Taths and slabs......... 666,050 pes, f 99-639 17 4
Sawn timber.... -- 106,200 feet.
{ Firewood, etc........... 129,750 tons.
Props and cap-pieces.... 290,300 pcs.
SANDHURST..... ) Taths and slabs.........1,174,500 pes f 92551 8 4
| Sawn lumber ........... 614,800 feet.
Firewood, etc. ...... 98,373 tons.
Props and cap-pieces 198,071 pes.
MARYBOROUGH. ) 7 aths and slabs..... 809,182 pes. f 53.647 4 38
Sawn timber.. ses. 786,987 feet.
Firewood, etc........... 68,190 tons.
Props and cap-pieces.... 142,791 pcs.
CasTLEMAINE... Laths and slabs......... 109,143 pes. 29,581 14 6
Sawn timber.... -. 456,100 feet.
Firewood, etc.......... 91,860 tons,
Props and cap-pieces.... 19,302 pes.
ARARAT....++-+ 1 Tathswnd slabs......... 70,021 pes, f 23984 0 11
Sawn timber............ 250,000 feet.
Firewood, etc. 12,744 tons.
Props and cap-pieces 37,656 pes.
Grers LAND.... 1 Taths and slabs. 2. 18\802 pes. 9,508 4 8
{ Sawn timber........--. 2 2083581 feet. J

 

V COBB isa jje scien eis £444,886 14 1
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 63

As a further evidence of the imperative necessity
of finding wood by a mode different to the present
means of obtaining it I translate and condense a por-
tion of a letter from an accomplished mining engi-
neer at Clunes (Wolfgang Mueller, Esq.), a spot which
once boasted of forest scenery: The fuel required
for the steam - engines alone at the mines of Clunes
amounts, at the present rate of working, to not less
than one million three hundred and eight thousand
cubic feet annually. The nearest forest is ten miles dis-
tant ; the price per cord ( of one hundred and twenty-
eight cubic feet) is27s. The cost of transit of the above
engine-fuel amounts alone to, approximately, £10,000
pro anno ; the whole expenditure being about £15,000.
The round wood, for subterranean use in the mines of
Clunes, now annually comes to one hundred and sixty
thousand running feet, ata value of £2,400 ; and this
round wood cannot now be obtained nearer, than from
twenty to twenty-five miles. The sawn and split
timber for the Clunes mines has to be carried quite
as far, adding about £700 to the wood expenses for
these mines, the total being probably not less than
£20,000 annually! No allowance is, however, made
in these calculations for the domestic fuel of the min-
ers. The price of wood is trebled already by cart-
age at that spot.

No natural local upgrowth, even if not destroyed by
fire or traffic, I am confident can come up to this rate
of consumption ; and it is evident that annually the
price for wood at these mining works must increase ;
for many mine this may become a, question alto-
gether as to the possibility of its further remunera-
tive working. The mining operations, moreover, are
64 FOREST CULTURE AND

generally at a yearly increase, through new gold dis-
coveries in the district spoken of, and elsewhere.
Although, on the Clunes mines, the price of wood has
not materially risen during the last six years, it must
be borne in mind that remuneration of labor hassunk,
indicating, in reality, a considerabte increase in the
price of the fuel. New railway lines may, certainly,
bring wood, for a time, at moderate prices, to the mi-
ners ; but this measure copes not with the real diffi-
culty of the wood question, but only defers it, as such
‘sources of supply will also become exhausted, while
carriage, from an indefinite distance, will become a
financial impossibility. The present price of coal, at
Clunes, is far too high to allow it to be substituted for
wood. Now let us pass on to still other considerations
bearing on this question. It so happens that the de-
crease of timber in our colonies is hastened by other
agencies than those of sacrifice for utilitarian supply.
Irrespective of the ordinary causes by which, in many
countries, the virgin forests became devastated, there
are, additionally, others which operate in our colony
to augment the extensive destruction of woods. The
miner ignites the underwood, with a view of uncover-
ing any quartz-reefs or tracing mineral riches of other
kinds. Although he desires only to force thus his way
through a limited space of scrub, or uncover, for inspec-
tion, a small extent of ground, he really sets, some-
times, the whole forest on fire, unchaining the furies of
the fiery element, which, in its ruinous and rapid prog-
ress, consumes innumerable stately trees, requiring the
growth of one or even several centuries to attain their
spacious dimensions, The burning trees, a prey of the
flames, carry with them many others in their fall;
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 65

others become partially scorched, and linger gradu-
ally to decay ; others become at least so far impaired
as to offer no longer a sound or superior timber, Very
aged Eucalyptus-trees are almost always suffering
already from natural decay in the central portions of
the stem, Jtis far from me to wish to impede the
operations and progress of the miners, to whose intel-
ligence and hard-working activity this country owes
so much; but the advantages of gold-mining in our
ranges may sometimes be too dearly bought at the
expense of very extensive forest-destruction, with all
the evils concomitant to it, or sure to follow it. Many
other causes—-such as the carelessness of travelers—
set also frequently portions of the forest on fire, while
the control over the devastation is lost.

The answer to remonstrances amounts usually to
an opinion that more wood is springing up again than
has been destroyed; but let us ask, how long will it
be until the suckers, saplings, or seedlings, which,
undoubtedly, in many instances, occupy the burned
ground, forming perhaps impenetrable thickets, until
they will really have advanced to the size of timber-
trees, fit for the saw-mill? In other localities, less
densely wooded, where the trees were so dispersed
as to give to the natural scenery, before it was dis-
turbed, a park-like appearance, in such localities,
which impressed on many of the original Australian
landscapes so much peculiarity, the growth of bushy
plants becomes, as arule, by occupation of the ground,
quickly destroyed ; theshelter and shade, which kept
the mostly rather horizontal roots of the Eucalyptus
trees cool and moist, become largely withdrawn ; the
pendent Jeaves and lax or distant ramifications of the
66 FOREST CULTURE AND

tree itself giving but partial shade. The soil, more-
over, remains no longer porous and permeable to
moisture—it gets hardened, bare and consolidated by
traffic and heat ; the necessary moisture is wanting
to keep the bark pliable, and to maintain the circula-
tion of the sap active or normal; bark and wood are
getting fissured and partly lifelesss; and now places
of seclusion, as well as a wood fit for their ready at-
tack, are given to numerous kinds of coleopterous and
other insects, which, by boring the ligneous tissue, are
sure to complete the destruction of the trees. Pict-
ures of absolute misefy of this kind may be noticed
around our city in all directions. I have succeeded
in saving many a venerable tree on the ground under
my control, and in arresting the incipient decay by
merely surrounding the base of the stem with earth
turfed over, serving as seats; or by removing the end-
less quantity of mistletoe, which sucks the life-sap
out of the branches, the invader perishing with its
victim, there being no longer a multitude of native
birds in populous localities to devour the mistle-berries.
In many low localities, again, the ground, indurat-
ed by traffic, collects a superabundance of moisture,
which becomes stagnant, and detrimental to the trees
of such spots. Various other peculiar causes tend to
the decay of our trees : to allude to all is beyond our
present object.
How to provide, therefore, in time, the wood
. necessary for our mines, railways, buildings, fences,
and as well as for the ordinary domestic and other
purposes, becomes a question which from year to year
presses With increased urgency on our attention, the
consideration of which we have already far too long
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 67

deferred. It may certainly be argued that in the
eastern portion and some of the southern parts of the
Victorian territory abundance of forests still exist —
enough to supply all wants for many years to come.
This is perfectly true in the abstract ; but how does
this argument apply, when we well know that such
timber occurs in secluded places, mostly on high and
broken ranges, without roads. And even if the latter
were constructed — which certainly will be required
gradually—at what price can such timber be conveyed
to the required distance ? Suppose, however, that
all these difficulties had been overcome, whence are
we to obtain the deals of northern Pines, the boards
of the Red Cedar, and the almost endless kinds of
other woods which future artisans will require ? For,
assuredly, neither Europe nor North America can
sustain the heavy call on their indigenous and even
planted forests for an indefinite period tocome. Trop-
ical woods might for a time be brought from the jun-
gles of three continents, but certainly not at a small
cost. Besides, tropical trees, as a rule, are not gre-
garious; we cannot judge beforehand, in every in-
stance, of their durability and other qualities; we
cannot recognize their extraordinary variety of sorts
specifically from mere inspection of the logs, and we
should find ourselves soon surrounded by endless dif-
ficulties and perplexities were we to depend on such
resources alone. Would it not be far wiser timely to
create independent resources of our own, for which
we have really such great facility ? With equal ear-
nestness another aspect of the timber question, as con-
cerning our national economy, forces itself on our
reflection. The inhabitable space of the globe is not
68 FOREST CULTURE AND

likely to increase, except through forces which would
initiate a new organic creation, or, at all events, bring
the present phase in the world’s history to a close ;
but while the area of land does not increase, mankind,
in spite of deadly plagues, of the horrors of warfare,
and of unaccountable oppressions and miseries, which
more extended education and the highest standard
of morals can only reduce or subdue — mankind, in
spite of all this, increases numerically so rapidly that
before long more space must be gained for its very
existence. Where can we look for the needful space ?
Is it in the tropic zones, with their humid heat and
depressing action on our energies? Or is it in the
frigid zone, which sustains but a limited number of
forms of organism ? Or is it rather in the temperate
and particularly our warm temperate zone, that we
have to offer the means of subsistence to our fellow-
men, closely located as they in future must be? But
this formation of dense and at the same time also
thriving settlements, how is it to be carried out,
unless, indeed, we place not merely our soil at the
disposal of our coming brethren, but offer with this
soil also the indispensable requisite of a vigorous
industrial life, among which requisites the easy and
inexpensive access to a sufficiency of wood stands
well-nigh foremost.

I may be met with the reply that the singular
rapidity of the growth of Australian trees is such as
to bring within the scope of each generation all that
is required, as far. as wood is concerned; and as a
corollary it would follow that each generation should
take advantage of the facility thus brought locally
within its reach. I can assure this audience that
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 69

enlightened nations abroad do far more than this, and
would not rest satisfied with the greater facilities here
enjoyed; they provide, with keen forethought and
high appreciation of their duty for their followers, that’
beforehand which cannot be called forth at any time
at will, If we examine this part of the question
more closely, we shall find much to think about —
much to act upon. Not even all our Eucalypts are of
rapid growth ; they, further, belong to a tribe of trees
with a hard kind of wood, which, though so valuable
for a multitude -of purposes, cannot supply all that
the needs of life daily demand from us for our indus-
trial work.

The quick - growing Eucalypts, among which the
Blue Gum-tree of this colony and Tasmania stands
pre-eminent, are comparatively few in number, nor
are these few all of gigantic size. They are, more-
over, restricted in their natural occurrence to limited
tracts of country, from which they must be estab-
lished by the hand of man in other soil for the neces.
sities of other communities—for the gratitude of other
populations. Then, again, the Pines of foreign lands,
often impressing a splendor on their landscapes, must
be brought to our shores—to our Alps—with an inten-
tion of utilizing every square mile of ground, how-
ever unpromising in its sterility ; for, after all, that
square mile represents a portion, albeit so small, of
the land-surface of the globe. Look at the picture
on this wall; see how the Norway Spruce (which
gives us so much of our deals and tar) insinuates its
massive roots through the fissures of disintegrating
rocks, or, failing to penetrate the stony structure,
sends its trailing roots over the surfacé and down the
70 FOREST CULTURE AND

sides of the barest rocks until they have found a
genial soil, however scanty, on the edge of a preci-
pice. Nature —ever active and laborious, ever wise
and beneficent -~allows the tree thus to live, thus to
convert the solid bowlders finally into soil, and all the
time adds unceasingly to the treasures of the domin-
ions of man. But just as time, with its measured
terms in fleet course, passes irresistably onward and
irrevocably away, so also have we to await the ap-
proaching* time, which all our wishes cannot accel-
erate in its unalterable measure.

“ Onward its course the present keeps,
Onward the constant current sweeps,
Till life is done ;
And did we judge of time aright,
The past and future in their flight
Would be as one.

Let no one fondly dream again
That hope and all her shadow-train
Will not decay ;
Fleeting as were the dreams of old,
Remembered like a tale that’s told ;
They pass away.”
LonGrexvLow (from ‘‘ Manrique’’).

We have, therefore, to await with patience these
measured terms before the child in its youthful impet-
uosity can reach the age of its highest hopes and sup-
posed glory — but, alas! leaving often a far happier
phase behind; or before a tree, from its youthful
grace, can have advanced to sturdy strength or lofty
height, to fulfill also its destiny and offer us its gifts.
We cannot call forth age at pleasure ; at best there is
involved a lapse of years before a timber-tree can
yield a plank, a beam, or even as much as a solid
post.

IT haye ehdeayored to arrive at some idea of the
EUCALYPTUS TREES, 71

real age of the larger trees, which are sinking daily
under our axes, often sacrificed unnecessarily. On
this occasion, as an apt one, I may, then, explain
that a period of a quarter or even half a century must
elapse before a solid plank, hardened by age, can be
obtained from even a rapid-growing Eucalyptus-tree.
It is estimated to require twenty to twenty-five years
before even a sleeper.of Blue Gum-wood can be obtain-
ed from a tree planted in ordinary soil; and that
double the time will elapse before a sown‘tree of the
still more durable Red Gum Eucalyptus will furnish
sleepers, such as hitherto have been in use for our
railway works. Buta supply of fuel from these trees
may be obtained much earlier. Mr. Adam Anderson,
a timber merchant of this city, concurs in this esti-
mate. :

Yet for forest operations we enjoy here.advantages
of two-fold kind, for which in middle Europe we are
justly envied. We can disseminate quickly-growing
Eucalyptus-trees in the most arid districts; we can
add to them, as a first shelter, many of the native
Casuarinas and Acacias, and thus gain cover for less
hardy trees of other countries. On the other hand,
we find in the moist and rich valleys of our ranges a
vast extent of space, where, under the mild influence
of the clime, sub-tropic trees could be reared million-
fold; where, for instance, whole forests of the Red
Cedar might be originated. Besides, we do not stand
at any disadvantage if we want to raise a belt of sea-
coast Pines all along the shores, or if we wish to rear
the Norway Spruce, or Silver Fir, or Larch, or Wey-
mouth Fir, or the Douglas Pine, or any of the Pitch-
pines of North America ; because we can cal] forth, if
72 FOREST CULTURE AND

we like, whole forests of them on sub-alpine heights,
never yet thus utilized.

Suppose we reckon that one hundred forest - trees
would be required to be planted on an acre, allowing
for periodic thinning out ; and assuming that for cli-
matic and hygienic considerations, as well as for the
maintenance of wood supply, we should require finally
one fourth of our Victorian territory kept as a forest-
area, we would expect to possess one billion five hun-
dred and sixty-eight million trees, and to provide for
their timely restoration in proportion to their removal
or natural loss.

Most of us are lulled into security by seeing that
we receive, as yet, our foreign woods in the course of
ordinary traffic, and we are not easily inclined to think
that the supply may cease suddenly, or be obtainable
only at an exorbitant expense. Even in the United
States of America there are places where the price of
fuel and timber has already risen fourfold. We are
told that recently, in the States of Wisconsin and
Michigan alone,,during one single year, two million
of Pine-trees were cut for lumber ; and itis estimated
that at the present rate of destruction no timber-trees
will be left in those States after fifty years, while it
will take a century to replace them, if even this be
possible. Quebec exported, in 1860, not less than sev-
enty million cubic feet of squared or sawn timber,
equal to about a million tons of wood —a large share
yielded by the Weymouth Pine (Pinus strobus)—not
taking into account the current local consumption.
This tree, yielding the white American Pine-wood,
requires fully sixty years of growth before it can be-
sawn into timber of any good size. During the first
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 73

two years of the recent civil war in North America,
twenty-eight thousand Walnut - trees were felled to
supply one single European factory with the material
for gun-stocks, demanded for this fratricidal war. Is
it not right to reflect timely on the vast extensions of
railroads, manufactures, mines, ship- building, dwell-
ings, and so forth, and then to ask, Where is the
wood-supply to come from? The requirements in
this direction must necessarily rise with the increase
of the population and the augmented refinements of
civilization, yet the area of supply we see constantly
decreasing. The loss on wheat crops during four of
the more recent years in the State of Michigan alone,
for want of shelter against cutting winds, was esti-
mated at £5,000,000, and this is regarded as the mere
sequence of the removal of the forests, and not trace-
able to exhaustive culture. Cereal crops and vines
were destroyed in many parts of South Europe, also,
through the complete want of shelter.

** More bleak to view the hills at length recede,
And less luxuriant, smoother vales extend;
Immense horizon-bounded plains succeed—

Far as the eye discerns, without an end."
Byron.

The Commissioner of the Land Office of the Unit-
ed States (Report for 1868) considers the Live Oak
(Quercus virens) — one of the best for ship-building—
nearly exterminated for all practical purposes, at least
as far as native forests are concerned ; while the Wal-
nut timber of North America, so much prized for cabi-
net-work, has well-nigh shared the same fate. The
transit of Walnut - wood from Missouri to New York
renders it already nearly as expensive as Mahogany,
whereas the latter has become likewise in West India
74 FOREST CULTURE AND

and Central America an article of great scarcity, and,
therefore, this important tree should be copiously
planted in the forests of tropical Australia. In the
earlier part of this century the supply of Saul timber
of Lower India (Shorea robusta) was thought inex-
haustible; but now, already, this heavy and durable
wood is hardly any longer procurable for ship-build-
ing. and engineering work, for which it is so much
sought. The axes of the woodmen will alsosoon make
such an inroad into the comparatively limited Yarrah
forests of West Australia that also this timber, which
for salt-water works is almost incomparable, will cease
to be available long before a new and sufficient supply
can be raised by regular culture.

The Land Commissioner of the United States fur-
ther reports, in 1868, that the frequent excessive
droughts, and the occasional destructive inundations
experienced a quarter of a century ago in Iowa, Kan-
sas, and Nebraska, have much diminished since the
regular settlement brought tree plantations and other
cultures into the extensive treeless prairies. Iowa
planted, in 1867, about seventy-six square miles of
forest, and one thousand eight hundred and eighty
four miles length of hedges. On the other hand, it is
estimated already, in 1864, by Mr. P. T. Thomas, of
New York, that the whole regions east of the Missis-
sippi would be stripped of all really useful timber with-
in twenty or thirty years ; while even for fuel great
inroads are constantly made into the American for-
ests, coal not being every where accessible in the States.
The Hon. T. M. Edmonds (Report of the Department
of Agriculture of U. S. for 1868) foresees the exhaus-
tion of the timber resources of the United States in
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 75

half a century, under existing circumstances, whereas
by that time the demand will be quadrupled. Mr.
Simmonds calculates the importation of wood into
France during 1865 at 154,000,000 francs, or about
£6,000,000, the ratio of import being at an increase,
notwithstanding that-the forest area of that empire
was reduced, within a century, to one half—namely,
from one third, in the latter part of the last century—
to hardly more than onesixth now. But if the popu-
lation of Middle Europe consumed proportionately as
much native wood as the inhabitants of the United
States, then, in less: than half a century, no forest
whatever would be left in Europe. These conclu-
sions are borne out by the U. S. Commissioner of
Lands, the Hon. Jos. 8. Wilson. In the States east
of the Mississippi, six billion cubic feet of wood were
consumed for timber and fuel in 1860, at a time when
no war laid hand on the forests. Hence,‘one million
of acres of forest-land must be cleared, in the Eastern
States of the Union, to find the wood for a years’ local
requirements. Theshipment of lumber, in one of the
latter years, from Chicago, was one billion four hun-
dred million cubic feet, besides two hundred and sev-
teen million laths, and nine hundred and twenty-eight
million shingles. In 1866, the products of the Cali-
fornia lumber trade were one hundred and ninety
million of cubic feet, and thirty-eight million shingles ;
in 1867, about two hundred million cubic feet. Que-
bec exports about one million of cubic feet since a long
period, annually, irrespective of home consumption.
In the Pacific States exists only a supply adequate to
the prospective wants of their people. The States
west of the Mississippi import already timber that
"6 FOREST CULTURE AND

formerly existed in their own native forests. Like-
wise so in North America an enormous lot of trees is
destroyed by girdling and subsequent burning, for
clearing agricultural lands or pastoral runs. Thus, in
the earlier part of the next century, every natural for-
est east of the Mississippi will have disappeared, if,
with an increasing population, the same rate of con-
sumption isgoingon. For the States west of the great
river, in which forest-land is much less extensive, the
prospects are still more alarming. Hence, Australia
cannot indifferently look forward for soft-wood from
these places.

To givesome idea how long a time will elapse before
-actual timber, not merely firewood, is obtained from
planted trees, I subjoin a brief list of the more com-
mon Middle European forest trees, together with notes
of their age when eligible for various titaber purposes :

   

Be@OChicss.sie-vsresociesavsciein acters: Sees oats Reis BOS eeeoHs 60-110 years.
Hornbeam ...6 cece cece cece cane cons cnee cece ween 10-100 *
Oak........ fee AOR S SEE aMIR ARNE AE ese ae FOSL20. SF

AIM eE saciamseanadcuie Sete iia Ven auiu seas BOLBO:
Birch css, cas teense eee soos eee setesaneane BOLO

Silver Fir.... 6... 0.0. 00s ssi cdiefodeoesaiapaeha a temeNnee 60-150“
Norway Spruce....... Wa ean in SS widened coon ees OOH150
Scotch Fir....... i ARs GENE ART Same cae sancanmannsdOGO
DAP Chests: aitiinsceakicesasnesntieca aetiaessewnae BORO

That, however, in our Winterless zone, such of
these trees as will endure a warmer clime would
advance with more quickness to maturity must be

 

*It should be remembered that most of our forest ranges are naturally
devoid of Pine-wood, only one species of Oallitris occurring in a few limited
mountain districts, while our second Callitris is a desert species. Without
coniferous trees of our own we shall finally experience difficulty of obtain-
ing the required supply of deals, pitch, turpentine, and pine-resin. Doubt-
less, for many wood-structureg now iron is substituted, but even a ship or
a house cannot be built entirely of iron, and the very production of the iron
is dependent on fuel. In the absence of coal, the use of iron, involving
here an expenditure for heavy freight, must necessarily be limited.
EUCALYPTUS TREES, 77

readily manifest. The accurate Customs returns for
the last year show an importation of foreign woods to
the value of £223,769 ; there was scarcely any export.
This very month the imported building-wood sent to
Sandhurst alone has cost £58,000. Some countries
have not been altogether unmindful of the conserva-
tion of their forests. Germany, already much devas-
tated at the time of the Romans, received its first for-
est laws as far back as the reign of Charlemagne —
indeed, with the commencement of agriculture and
the settling of the nomadic hunter on fixed habita-
tions. The forests thus discontinued to be common
property, and in the fourteenth century commenced
already a forest economy. Full legislation, regular
management and actual cultivation of trees on an
extensive scale, date back one hundred and fifty
years. Venice formed its forest laws alfeady in the
fifteenth century. Although the desire for ample
hunting-territory gave a great impulse to the restric-
tions placed on the encroachment of the Middle Eu-
ropean forests, this at the same time saved them to
the country.

Within the operations of wood culture may also be
included that of subduing drift-sand, and solidifying
the latter finally by plantations. For this purpose can
be chosen the Haleppo Pine, Cluster Pine, Scotch Fir,
or our own less arboreous so-called seashore Tea-trees
(Melaleuca parviflora and Leptospermum levigatum),
further the drooping She-oak (Casuarina quadrivalvis),
the coast Honeysuckle (Banksia integrifolia), and also
our desert cypress, or so-called Murray Pine. As not
only in close vicinity to our fine city one wilderness
of shifting sand exists, but as also in other places of
78 FOREST CULTURE AND

our shores the sand is invading villages, towns, and,
perhaps, harbors, and as, moreover, many a desert
spot inland may be reclaimed, I would remark that,
to arrest the waves of the sand, some wickerwork or
cover of brush is needed on the storm side. Large
seaweeds help to form such covering. Sods of Me-
sembryanthemum, to which the unpoetic name of
‘‘ Pigfaces’’ is here given, and which abounds on our
coast, should copiously be scattered over the sand-
ridges; wild cabbage, celery, sea-kale, samphire, New
Zealand spinach (Tetragonia), chamomile, and various
clovers and bloom plants should be sown, and creep-
ing sand-grass (Festuca litoralis, Triticum junceum,
Buffalo-grass, Agrostis stolonifera), etc., should be
planted, particulary, also, sand-sedges and sand-rush-
es, among the best of which are Carex arenaria, and
here the Sword Rush (Lepidosperma gladiatum ).
Psoralea pinnata and Rhus typhinum, Prunus mari-
tima (the Canadian sea-coast plum), Ailanthus gland-
ulosa, proved also valuable in this respect. As eligi-
ble, I may add, also, the native couch-grass (Cynodon
Dactylon), the South African Ehrharta gigantea, the
European Psamma arenaria, Elymus arenarius (or
Lyme), even the Live-oak (Quercus virens) ; as also
another American Oak (Quercus obtusiloba), and the
Turkey Oak (Quercus cerris), and, perhaps, Poplars,
some Willows, and, among firs, the Pinus insignis,
Pinus edulis, P. rigida, and P. Australis. The com-
mon Brake Fern helps also much to conquer the sand.
The New Zealand flax covers coast -sand naturally,
within the very exposure of the spray.* It is need-

 

* Dr. Jam. Hector calculated that in New Zealand an acre of good flax
land contained about one hundred thousand leaves of the Phormium tenax,
and yields about ten tons weight of dried leaves; or, if only the outer leaves
are taken, four tons. The yield of clean fiber is about twenty-three one
hundredths of the green leaf,
EUCALYPTUS TREES. "9

less to remark that exclusion of traffic from the sand
is imperative, as also security against ingress of goats
and domestic animals of any kind, otherwise the ef-
fort is hopeless. Fencing of the area and stringent
municipal laws will make, however, any operations
of this kind, even without great expense, a success,
as, in consequences of my advice, has- been shown
at Queenscliff. Wood - culture on drift - sand carries
with it also the recommendation of providing the
needful belt of shelter which each coast should pos-
sess. There are a few other Pines—for instance, Pi-
nus Taeda, the Loblolly Pine of North America, and
several other trees which grow fast in sand, whenever
it is no longer moving ; they endure the sea-storms,
gradually consolidate the soil, and render it, in course
of time, arable. In South Africa, some Protes and
Leucospermums, the Virgilia, also Myrica, grow in
coast-sand. All these planting operations must be
performed very early, and in the cool season. The
grasses and herbs must precede the pines and other
trees. Technic industries will gain from these pines
in due time. ;

I now beg to offer some brief data in reference to
the present consumption of wood in Victoria.

After the perusal of various official returns, Iam
inclined to assume that twenty tons would be a fair
average of the quantity of fuel consumed in each
household. This would amount to rather more than
three millions of tons of wood as the present annual
requirement of domestic fuel in this colony. In the
city and suburbs the consumption is considerably less
than in the farming districts, on account of the use of
coal. In reference to the return of mining- wood,
80 FOREST CULTURE AND

quoted on this occasion, a large allowance must yet
be made for the enormous mass of wood from the felled
trees, which is left unutilized in the ranges, the dis-
tance, in many cases, being too great to convey the

off-fall of the timber for the purpose of fuel.

The fol-

lowing data convey some information on the annual

consumption ef wood in various districts :

Ararat (under license)........... 0. cee cece eee eee
“« (without “ ) .......... teeowene baa a reas
Blackwood Mining Division..............0.000000
Ban yous sas s0 sie icnvsess cordarns seessedera teed
Colac (for saw-mills, 6,000 tons ; posts and rails, 6,000
tons ; shingles, 2,000 tons ; fuel, 30,000 tons)....
Creswick (sawn timber for Clunes, 15,000 tons ; sawn
timber for Amherst, 2,000 tons ; sawn timber for
Creswick, 2,500 tons; fuel for Clunes, 30,000

tons ; fuel for Creswick, 20,000 tons)...........
Castlemaine. sii. ccocsissistescacuadicuetemacndenrcheaaaie a ad
Castértoni«'s + s:2<.06.45 ses aoetinnins ae veeee chaweNee cede
Daylesford (mining timber, 20,000 tons ; fuel, 50,000
LONE) Sacschilocore. save) WA, beet Velstele ie sisi alelnnds otalee lve

Dunkeld—sawn iaiber, 800,000 feet; rails, 20,000
pieces ; Red Gum posts, 10,000 pieces.

Granite sca ne dad Sts wikia Miia des sesinos ba ceairer obmaumeces
Mary borough) siisisusisdescene sc avededwie cs secceeenie
Nunawading (cut under license).......,.....00e.008
fe ( “ without “ )....... eisiawiadais siete ¥%
Sandhurst). /acag to cages iaohosaawmceceesosety
( Another informant aires the approximate quan-
tity used solely for fuel at 160,000 tons. )

SGA MANG isi oc wick oe uie vie aes yshein Mivaurentewmente eve se
Talbot (Shire of) and Borough of Amherst—Domestic
fuel for 2,887 houses, at 6 cords or 19 1-5 tons,
55,430 tons ; mining timber, 18,368 tons ; mills,
3,200 tons ; charcoal, 3,328 tons ; public institu-
tions, 2,560 tons ; bakers, etc., 1,600 tons ; fenc-

ing and building, 6,400 tons.......... Setiewas ve

Tons.
13,146
13,146
12,000
40,000

44,000

69,500
37,500
14,000

70,000

13,600
57,200
52,000

4,600

10,000

190,000
300,000

90,886
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 81

Taradale (two sevenths for mining and five sevenths

for fuel) io sieiiaie see's vs e sleists iat gnsieisigseierece eamiose aie aad 8,750
Parnag all aie int ecb 8 ee eased Heme asaisie 20,000 to 30,000
Tylden (for fuel, 3,890 tons; saw-mills, 15,500 tons ;

for splitter’s use, 2,476 tons)..........eeeeeeeee 21,466
Villiers, County of (approximately)........... neta 150,000

Whittlesea—As much as 1,800 trees are annually “ised
for palings, shingles, etc.
Winchelsea i... ons cir edi ace ce nies owesaae ada te 28,600
Wood's Polmticco:.iceccaeddcn cso eae enw cee Cie tase 8,700
Woodend (for firewood and split or squared timber-cut
under license, wholly exclusive of that used by
BAW=MILULS). sis ceardiad.ows sanwernawcarw aude eure e eee. 43,181

On the modes of raising or renovating forests, not
much can be said on this occasion. For natural up-
growth, perfect clearing and fencing is recommend-
able. Subsequently, the removal of young, crooked
trees and the surplus of saplings is needed. Seed-
lings may be transferred from spots where they stand
too densely, to more open or bare places. Suckers
should be destroyed where the gain of good timber is
an object. Periodic clearing of young trees is effect-
ed according to the rate of growth of the particular
species ; lopping of branches is advisable should they
densely meet. For broadcast sowing, the ground
should be completely cleared and burnt. By break-
ing the ground a great acceleration of growth of the
trees is attained, even to a tenfold degree. Planting
in rows affords the best access for subsequent thinning
and successive removal of the timber; the Quincunx
system will give approach in three directions. Pines |
are planted in Germany only about seven feet apart, as
they require least room of all trees; but fifteen feet
is a fair distance at an age of forty years. The New
Hampshire Pine stands only five or six feet apart at
82 FOREST CULTURE AND

an age of fifty years, and yet is not prevented by this
crowded growth to be then one hundred feet high ;
the stems are then very straight, eighteen inches in
diameter at the base. If Pines and Oaks are promis-
cuously planted, then the former, which act as nurse-
trees, are moved in ten or twenty years, and the
ground is left to the Oak, or any other deciduous
tree, at distances at first ten or twelve feet apart, and
subsequently wider still. No decayed wood is left
in planted forests, as it would harbor boring insects.
Pines are considered not to increase much in value
after eighty years, when most of them have attain-
ed full maturity, and grow only afterward slowly.
Sometimes as many as one thousand two hundred
Pine-trees are set out on an acre, with a view of early
utilization of a portion of the young trees. The rate
of growth may be much accelerated in most trees
by irrigation ; hence mountain streamlets should be
diverted into horizontal ditches where forests are
occupying hill-sides. The best-cultivated forests of
Germany are worth from three to five times as much
as native woods.

For shelter plantations, intended to yield ultimate-
ly also timber and fuel to farming populations, it is
recommendable to adopt the American method, ac-
cording to which belts of trees are regularly planted
at about quarter-mile distance; the belts, according
to circumstances, to be from four to ten rods wide,
and to be formed in such direction as to front the pre-
vailing winds. These timber-belts are usually fenc-
ed. Such shelter-trees are likely to rise to thirty
feet in ten years, and have proved so advantageous
as to double the farm crop, while judicious managey
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 83

ment of these tree-belts will supply the wood neces-
sary for the farm. There are one million and four
hundred thousand square miles of treeless plains in
the United States, which, in due course of time, will
necessarily be converted, to a great extent, into agri-
cultural areas on account of the generally excellent
soil. The Locust-tree is much chosen for shelter pur-
poses. Denuded wood-land, of poor soil, left undis-
turbed to natural renovation, has become, in some
populous localities, five times as valuable as the ad-
joining inferior tillage or pasture-land. For the great-
est profit in fuel, the trees, in some parts of North
America, are cut about every sixteen years. We
here, commanding Eucalypts, Acacias, and Casuari-
nas, would gain wood- harvests still speedier. The
increased value of less fertile lands, through sponta-
neous upgrowth of timber, is estimated at sixteen
hundredths of simple interest annually in woodless
localities, no labor being expended on this method of
wood-culture. Judicious management in thinning
out enhances the value of such forest land still more.
Wet and undrained grounds can be made to yield a
return in Elms, Willows, Cottonwood, Swamp Cy-
presses, and other swamp trees, or stony declivities
in Pines and Eucalypts, at a trifling cost. For details,
the forest literature, which is in Germany particularly
rich, should be studied. Capitalists would likely find
it safer and more profitable to secure land for timber-
growth than to invest in many another speculation.
After the example set at Massachusetts our agricul-
tural societies might award premiums and medals for
the best timber-plantations raised in their districts.
We haye societies for the protection of domestic ani-
84 FOREST CULTURE AND

mals, native or introduced birds, young fish, etc.;
why could not a strong and widely-spreading league
be organized for the saving of the native forests ?
Might not every child in a school plant a memorial
tree, to be intrusted to its care, to awaken thus an
interest in objects of this kind at an early age ?

Reverting to the importance of shelter, let me
remark that fifty years ago the Peach flourished in
North Pennsylvania, in Ohio and New York, where
it cannot any longer now be grown, in consequence
of the now colder and far more changeable climate,
after the forests became extensively removed. Even
ordinary orchards and cereal fields suffer there now.
Yet, poor land will yield a better return in wood than
in corn crops, and it is not too much to say that the
favorable effect of a young forest on climate may be
felt already, after a dozen years. Even on ordinary
sheep-runs, trees are of the greatest importance, both
for shelter and shade,

Having endeavored to explain forest value as it pre-
sents itself in its primary aspects — namely, in refer-
ence to its importance to Nature’s great economy, and
in reference to its timber resources, as viewed in the
abstract-—-I now proceed to enter on a new field of
consideration, which, though secondary in impor-
tance, is well deserving of our calm attention ; and
this all the more since this field of industrial enter-
prise remained yet almost bare or unharvested, where-
as any utilization of this new ground must have, to
inquiring minds, more than ordinary charm.

I therefore now proceed to explain some of the
technologic features of woodlands.

A leading industry in all forests is the production
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 85

of charcoal. It may be made in mounds, caverns, or
ovens. The method most frequently adopted is that
in mounds or meilers, and to this I may devote a few
explanatory words, as not every one in this hall may
be conversant with the process; for, simple as the
process does appear, it is, after all, not performable
without some skill, if coal of a superior quality is to
be the result. The wood is closely packed around a
central post in regular form, the pieces either all hor-
izontally, or, oftener, the lower vertically. Only such
wood should be used as is unfit for timber; it must,
however, be of one kind only, or of such various sorts
as require the same degree of heat for being converted
into a perfect coal. It must be sound and almost air-
dry. A loamy sand-soil’ forms the best base for a
mound ; and this soil requires to be broken up, lev-
eled and pressed, also dried by branchlets being burnt
on the ground. The form of the mound or meiler is
usually hemispherical, and support is given to this
mound in the manner indicated in the sketch here
presented, the outer support consisting of short logs
of wood. ,

The inner part of the cover is formed of sods of
grass, branchlets, rushes, and similar substances; over
this is placed the outer portion of the cover, consist-
ing of moist forest-soil, particularly fresh humus.
The united covering must permit the vapors of the
glowing meiler to escape. Shelter against wind is
absolutely requisite ; the operation of burning coal can
therefore be well performed only in still air. The
ignition commences from an opening left purposely,
either at the base or, less frequently, at the summit
of the structure, but either opening is closed again

*K
86 FOREST CULTURE AND

during the burning process. Caution is needed to
prevent the expansive vapors and gases causing ex-
plosions during the glowing of the wood. To pro-
rmoote combustion on places where it may have been
suppressed, holes are forced through the covering on
the second or third day, particularly on the lee side.

A bursting forth of gases of a blueish hue indicates
active burning, and under such circumstances the
access given tothe air must be closed, while new per-
forations are made in any yet inactive portion of the
meiler.

Over-great activity of fire is suppressed by water
applied to the covering, or by adding to the thickness
of the latter. Strong sinking of the cover during the
earlier burning proves more or less complete combus-
tion of the coal, and it may then become necessary to
refill hurriedly the holes with wood or coal, under-
closure of all openings, and careful restoration of the
cover thus temporarily removed on one spot. This
refilling in large meilers may be required for five days
in succession ; but the more carefully the mound has
been built, and the more watchfully the early glow-
ing process has been conducted, the less necessity will
arise for the troublesome and wasteful process of re-
filling. A final additional covering becomes frequent-
ly needful. The operation closes by the sinking of
the cover, or by its being partially forced downward,
and the ready coals are removable one day afterward.
Partial withdrawals of coal can be effected from the
lee side while the meiler is still active.

The specific gravity of charcoal stands generally in
aprecise proportion to the specific weight of the wood
employed. Dryer wood realizes a heavier, moister
EUCALYPTUS TREES, 87

wood a lighter coal. Slow combustion also renders
the coal heavier than a more rapid burning process,
because in the latter case more carbon is consumed
for various volatile products formed from the wood.
As a rule, the quantity of coal obtained is about a
quager of the weight of wood employed. Good coal
has a slight metallic lustre, is firm, not friable, caus-
ing a clear sound when thrown on the ground. It
must burn without flame and smoke. For trade pur-
poses coal must be kept dry, as its absorption of hu-
midity is considerable.* The heating power of coal
as compared to wood is ascertained to be as one hun-
dred to fifty-five or sixty. An equal Volumen of wood
produces less heating effect than the same space of
coal. For technic operations the equable and more
lasting heat, and the great power of radiation, give
to charcoal its special value. Igniting wood for char-
coal in caverns is wasteful, through the great access
of air.

By the method of carbonizing wood in ovens, tar
and other volatile products can be secured. The wood
chosen for coal intended for gunpowder is chiefly
that of Willows, Poplars, Alder, and Lime. It must
be healthy, and is preferred from young trees. Woods
which contain a good deal of hygroscopic salts—such
as that of Elms, Firs, Oaks—are not adapted for the
purpose. Extreme degrees of heat in producing coal
for gunpowder or blasting powder should be avoided,
otherwise the best wood will not serve the purpose,
because the powder would be less ready to ignite.
The yield of this coal is sixteen to seventeen one

 

z
*For extensive details consult yon Berg’s Anleitung zum Verkohlen ; also,
Muspratt’s Chemistry.
88 FOREST CULTURE AND

hundredths from the wood. Local powder-mills are
sure to be established here, especially as sulphur is
readily obtainable from New Zealand. The increase
of manufactures is also certain to augment the de-
-- mand for wood and coal hereafter. For many indus-
trial purposes charcoal is far preferable to fossilgpal.
Coals from various kinds of Victorian wood are placed
before you.

It was my intention, while explaining the industrial
resources of the forest, to show also how tar, vinegar
and spirits might be obtained by heating wood in
close vessels, at a temperature of three hundred to
three hundred and fifty centigr., under a process call-
ed dry distillation. But I must reserve this subject
for another occasion; for, however simple the proced-
ure may be regarded, as far as the actual performance
of this artisan’s work is concerned, yet the-chemic
processes, which are active in this form of decomposi-
tion, are of the greatest complexity; they present,
moreover, according to the wood employed and ac-
cording to the degree of heat applied, some peculiar-
ities, which as yet have not been fully investigated,
holding out hope for the discovery of some new dyes
and other educts. It will be scarcely credited by most
of this audience that the paraffin, which now large-
ly enters into the material for the candles of our house-
holds, is not only obtainable from bituminous slates,
turf and fossil coal, but is also produced by the heat-
ing of wood under exclusion of air. This substance
is furthermore a hydrocarbon of great purity ; and its
cheap preparation, along with other substances from
our native wood, may possibly become a local source
of immense wealth. For obtaining information on the
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 89

products from heated wood, and the various appa-
ratus employed in dry distillation, reference may be
made to the great work, Chemistry Applied to Arts
and Manufactures, by Professor Muspratt, a man of
genius and industry, whose death within the last few
months we had so deeply to deplore.

Presented to you here are samples of tar, acetic
acid, and alcohol, from several of our more common
woods ; also pieces of pine-wood, coated with euca-
lyptus tar, the black color, with its fine lustre, have
remained unimpaired fora series of years. Our wood-
tar would, for many industrial purposes, be equal in
value to the best kinds of other tar, and may prove,
in some respects, superior to them.

Among the undeveloped wood-resources we must
not pass that referring to potash, particularly as this
alkali can be obtained without sacrifice of any valua-
ble timber, and from localities not accessible to the
wood trade.

For the preparation of potash, the wood, bark,
branches, and foliage are burnt in pits sunk three or
four feet in the ground ; the incineration is continued
till the pit isalmost filled with ashes. Young branch-
es and leaves are usually much richer in potash than
the stem-wood ; hence they should not be rejected.
The ashes thus obtained are placed, in tubs or casks,
on straw, over a false bottom.

Cold water, in moderate quantities, is poured over
the ash, and the first strong potash-liquid removed
for evaporation in flat iron vessels, while the weaker
fluid is used for the lixiviation of fresh ashes.

While the evaporation proceeds, fresh portions of
strong liquid are added until the concentrated boil-
ing fluid assumes a rather thick consistence, :
90 FOREST CULTURE AND

At last, with mild heat and final constant stirring,
the whole is evaporated to dryness. This dry mass
represents crude potash more or less impure, accord-
ing to the nature of the wood employed.

A final heating in rough furnaces is needed, to ex-
pel sulphur combinations, water, and empyreumatic
substances; also, to decompose coloring principles.
Thus pearlash is obtained.

Pure carbonate of potassa in crude potash varies
from forty to eighty per cent. Experiments, as far
as they were instituted in my laboratory, have given
the following approximate result with respect to the
contents of potash in some of our most common trees.
The wood of our She-oaks (Casuarina suberosa and
Casuarina quadrivalvis), as well as that of the Black
or Silver Wattle (Acacia decurrens), is somewhat rich-
er than wood of the British Oak, but far richer than
the ordinary Pine woods.

The stems of the Victorian Blue Gum-tree (Euca-
lyptus globulus), and the so-called swamp Tea- tree
(Melaleuca ericifolia), yield about as much Potash as
European Beech.

The foliage of the Blue Gum-tree proved particu-
larly rich in this alkali; and as it is heavy and easily
collected at the saw-mills, it might be turned there to
auxiliary profitable account, and, indeed, in many
other spots of the ranges.

A ton of the fresh leaves and branches yielded, in
two analyses, four and three quarters pounds of pure
potash, equal to about double the quantity of the av-
erage kinds of pearlash. The three species of Euca-
lypts spontaneously occurring closearound Melbourne
—the Red Gum-tree (Eucalyptus rostrata) ; the Man-
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 91

na Gum-tree (Eucalyptus viminalis) ; the Box Gum-
tree (Eucalyptus melliodora) produced nearly three
pounds of pure potash, or about five pounds of pearl-
ash from a ton of fresh leaves and branches ; while a
ton of the wood of the Red Gum-tree, in a dried state,
gave nearly two pounds weight of pure carbonate of
potassa, whereas the wood of the Blue Gum-tree
proved still richer. A ton of the dry wood of the
erect She-oak (Casuarina suberosa) furnished the large
quantity of six and one half pounds of pure potash.
This result is about equal to that obtainable from the
European Lime-tree or Linden-tree, which again is
one of the richest of all European trees in this respect.

Such indications may suffice to draw more fully the
attention of forest settlers to an important but as yet
latent branch of industry. For further details I refer
to elaborate tables of the yield of potash in native
trees, as the result from analyses made under my
direction by Mr. Chr. Hoffmann — these tabulated
statements being appended to my departmental re-
port, presented to Parliament in 1869. The whole-
sale price of the best pearlash is about £8 for the cwt.
in Melbourne.

I wish it distinctly to be understood that I do not
advocate an indiscriminate sacrifice of our forest-trees
for any solitary one of its products, such as the pot-
ash; because by any such procedure we would still
more accelerate the reduction of our woods. On the
contrary, good timber, fit for splitting or for the saw-
mill, ought to be far too precious for potash or tar
preparation. But branch-wood, bark, roots, crooked
stems, and even foliage, might well be utilized for _
this industry, wherever the place is too remote to dis-
92 FOREST CULTURE ‘AND

pose of this material for fuel. The recommendation
carries with it still more weight, if we remember how
on many places the close growth of suckers or seed-
lings has to be thinned to allow of space for the new

’ and unimpaired upgrowth of actual timber ; whereas,
moreover, now the remnants at places where trees
have been felled, often block by impenetrable barri-
cades the accessible lines of traffic through the forests,
and are frequently the cause of the extensive confla-
grations of the woods, by placing so much combus-
tible, dry, and mostly oily material within the easy
reach of the current of flames. Should, unfortunately,
the fiery element have anywhere swept through the
forest, it may then prove advantageous to collect the
fresh ashes before they are soaked by rain, with the
object of extracting thus large quantities of potash.
The whole process of potash preparation being one of
the simplest kind, and involving only a very trifling
expense in casks and boiling-pans, can be carried out
anywhere as a by-work, the profit thus being not
reduced by skilled or heavy labor or by costly plant.
The demand for potash must always be considerable,
as it is required for the factories of niter (particularly
from soda saltpeter), one of the three principal in-
gredients of gunpowder and blasting-powder ; it is
needed also for glass, alum, various kinds of soaps,
dyes, and many chemicals.*

Potash, although universally distributed, is best
obtained in the manner indicated. JI may remark,
however, though deviating fromm my subject, that it is
one of the most potent constituents in all manures,

 

* Flint-glass contains about a fifth pure pearlash ; crown-glass, the best
window-glass, rather more than a quarter. Some potash-niter is wanted also
in either case.
EUCALYPTUS TREES, 93

being especially needed in the soil for all kinds of root-
crops, for vine and maize ; nor can most other plants
live without it altogether, although the quantity re-
quired may be small; but I must add, for manuring,
potash by itself would be far too valuable.

Almost every kind of forage affords potash salts,
these being among the necessaries for the support of
herbivorous animals. Their undue diminution in food
is the cause of various diseases, both in the animal
and vegetable world; or predisposes, by abnormal
chemic components of the organisms, to disease.

The muscles of the human structure require a com-
paratively large proportion of carbonate of potassa ; it
is also absolutely required in blood, predominating in
the red corpuscles. Plants grown in soil of rocks con-
taining much feldspar—such as granite, gneiss, syen-
ite, some porphyries, diorite—are always particularly
productive in potash, potassium entering largely into
felspatic compounds, The latter mineral yields, in
most cases, from twelve to fourteen per cent. of po-
tassa, which, if changed to carbonate, would become
augmented by nearly one half more. It is fixed chiefly
to silicic acid in feldspar, and thus only tardily set free
through disintegration, partly by the chemic action
of air, water, and various salts, partly through the
mechanic force of vegetation.* The importation of
potash into Victoria during 1870 was only one hun-
dred and seventy tons, but, with the increase of
chemic factories, we shall require much more.

It has justly been argued that the chemic analysis
affords a very unsafe guidance to the artisan, as re-
gards the quantity of potash obtainable from any kind

 

* The proverb of chemistry — ‘‘ Corpora non agunt, nist fluida”’ — is here
ajso applicable, .
94 FOREST CULTURE AND

of tree or other plant, inasmuch as necessarily the per-
centage must fluctuate according to the nature of the
soil, this, again, depending on geologic structure and
the quality and quantity of decaying foliage on any
particular spot. It should, however, not be quite for-
gotten that most plants have a predilection for that
soil which contains, in regions otherwise favorable to
them, also due proportions of such mineral particles as
are essentially necessary for the normal nutrition of
the peculiar species ; for, otherwise, in the wild com-
bat for space it would succumb or cede before the
more legitimate occupant of such soil. Hence, at a
glance, even from long distances, we may recognize
in many of our forest regions an almost abrupt line
of demarcation between the gregarious trees, where
one geologic formation meets or replaces the other.
Thus, trees richer in potash, or oils, or any other
product, may often be traced with ease over their
geologic area, for which purpose the admirable maps
of Mr. Selwyn and his collaborators afford us here in
Victoria also in this respect already so very much
facility.

I have often been led to think that many an indi-
gent person might find employment by collecting the
wood-ashes, which, as a powerful manure, or as ma-
terial for a local potash-factory, ought to realize a fair
price. Such an employment would be probably as
lucrative as collecting glass, or bones, or substances
for paper-mills, while the ashes, now largely wasted,
would be fully utilized.

It may be assumed that, at an average, the ash of
our ordinary. Eucalypts contains ten per cent. of crude
potash, equal to about five per cent, pure potash, A
EUCALYPTUS TREES, 95

bucketful of wood-ash, such as we daily remove from
our domestic fire-places, contains about twenty-five
pounds, from which, accordingly, about two and one
half pounds of inferior, or one and one fourth pounds
of superior potash, may be obtained; the former
being worth about sixpence per pound, the latter
double the price. For ascertaining the contents of
carbonate of potassa in crude potash or pearlash, cer-
tain instruments, well known as alkali- meters, are
constructed. The heaviest ashes, as a rule, contain
the greatest proportion of potash. The brake-fern, so
common on many river-banks and sandy tracts of the
country, is rich in this alkali.

Apart from my subject, I may, however, say that
there are other sources of potash-salts than trees alone.
Chloride of potassium is obtained from some large
salt-beds, for instance, in Prussia. From this source it
was supplied to British manufactories, in 1869, to the
extent of one hundred and fifty-four thousand four
hundred and sixty-eight hundred weight, valued at
above £60,000. This chloride is besides obtained, under
Mons. Balard’s process (Report of Juries at the Inter.
national Exhibition for 1862), in considerable quanti-
ties from sea-water, as one of the contents to be util-
ized. From this chloride the various potash salts,
otherwise largely obtained from pearlash, can be also
prepared. Chlorides and sulphates, if they occur in
crude potash, can, in the process of purification, almost
completely be removed through crystallization from
the greatly concentrated solution.

Let us now approach another forest industry, one
quite unique and peculiar to Australia—namely, the
distillation of volatile oi] from Eucalyptus and allied
96 FOREST CULTURE AND

Myrtaceous trees, While charcoal, tar, wood-vinegar,
wood-spirit, tannic substances and potash, are obtain-
able and obtained from the woods of any country, we
have in Australia a resource of our own in the Euca~-
lyptus oil. In no other part of the globe do we find
the Myrtaces to prevail; in Europe it is only the
Myrtus of the ancients, the beautiful bush for bridal
wreaths, which there represents this particular family
of plants; and although copious species of Eugenia
and other berry-bearing genera, including the aro-
matic clove and allspice, are scattered through the
warmer regions of Asia, Africa, and America, all per-
vaded by essential oil, they do not constitute the
main bulk of any forests as here, nor can their oil in
chemic or technic properties be compared to that of
the almost exclusively Australian Eucalyptus. This
special industry of ours exemplifies also, in a manner
quite remarkable, how from apparently insignificant
experiments may arise results far beyond original an-
ticipations, When, in 1854, as one of the commis-
sioners for the Victorian Industrial Exhibition, held
in anticipation of the first Paris Exhibition, I induced
my friend, Mr. Joseph Bosisto, J. P., to distil the oil
of one of our Eucalypts, I merely wished to show that
this particular oil might be substituted for the com-
paratively costly oil of cajuput, obtained in some
parts of India, and rather extensively used in some
countries for medical purposes. For the exhibition
of 1862 about thirty different oils were prepared by
the same gentleman, chiefly from various Eucalypts, |
and from material mostly selected by myself for the
purpose. This led not merely to determining the
"percentage of yield, but also to extensive experi»
RUCALYPTUS TREES. 97

iments, here chiefly by Messrs. Bosisto and Osborne,
and in London by Dr. Gladstone, in reference to the
illuminating power, the solvent properties, and other
special qualities of each of these oils. The principal
results of these experiments were recorded in reports
of the exhibition jurors at the time. Mr. Bosisto,
with great sagacity and a commendable perseverance,
but also at first with much sacrifice of capital, carried
his researches so far as to give to them great utilita-
rian value and mercantile dimensions ; moreover, he
patented a process by which he was enabled to derive
from the eucalyptus foliage the greatest amount of
the purest essential oil with the least consumption of
fuel and application of labor. Under this process it
became possible to produce the oil at a price so cheap
as to allow the article to be used in various branches
of art—for instance, in the manufacture of scented
soap, it having been ascertained that this oil sur-
passed any other in value for diluting the oils of roses,
of orange flowers, and other very costly oils, for
which purposes it proved far more valuable than the
oil of rosemary and other ethereal oils hitherto used.
Suddenly, then, such a demand arose that our
thoughtful and enterprising fellow-citizen could ex-
port already about nine thousand pounds to England
and three thousand pounds to foreign ports, though
even now this oil is as yet but very imperfectly known
abroad. The average quantity now produced at his
establishment, for export, is seven hundred pounds
per month. Alcoholic extracts of the febrifugal foli-
age of Eucalyptus globulus and Eucalyptus amygda-
lina have also been exported in quantity by the same
gentleman to England, Germany, and America
98 FOREST CULTURE AND

Similar substances from various melaleucas might be
added. Originally, an opinion was entertained that
all the eucalyptus oils have great resemblance to each
other; such, however, proved not to be the case when
it came to accurate experimental tests. Thus, for
instance, the oil which in such rich percentage is
obtained from Eucalyptus amygdalina, though excel-
lent for diluting the most delicate essential oils, is of
far less value as a solvent for resins in the fabrication
of select varnishes. For this latter purpose the oil
of one of the dwarf Eucalypts forming the Mallee
Scrub, a species to which I gave, on account of its
abundance of oil, the name ‘Eucalyptus oleosa”’
nearly a quarter of a century ago, proved far the best.
It is this Mallee oil which now is coming into exten-
sive adaptations for dissolving amber, Kauri resin,
and various kinds of copal. Mr. Bosisto’s researches
are recorded in the volume of the Royal Society of
Victoria for 1868; Mr. Osborne’s in the Jurors’
Reports of the Exhibition of 1862. For alluding so
far to this oil distillation I have a special object in
view. I wish to see it adopted near and far as a col-
lateral forest industry, now that the way for the ready
sale of this product is so far paved. The patentee is
willing to license any person to adopt his process, and
he is also ready to purchase the oil at a price which
will prove remunerative to the producer. If it is now
considered how inexhaustible a material for this oil
industry is everywhere accessible in our ranges, how
readily it is obtainable, particularly at saw-mills and
at splitters’ establishments, and how easily the pro-
cess of the distillation can be performed, it would be
really surprising should these facilities not be seized
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 99

upon, and should under such favorable circumstances
not a far larger export of this mercantile commodity
be called forth. Those Eucalypts are the most pro-
ductive of oil in their foliage which have the largest
number of pellucid dots in their leaves; this is easily
ascertained by viewing the leaves by transmitted
light, when the transparent oil- glands will become
apparent, even without the use of a magnifying lens.
Mr. Bosisto is also a purchaser of scented flowers,
indigenous as well as cultivated, including even the
wattle flowers, for the extraction of delicate scents,
under a clever process discovered by himself; and it
is astonishing what an enormous demand for these
perfumes exists in European markets. This may be
a hint to any one living in or near the forests, where
the extraction of the scent could be locally accom-
plished from unlimited resources, with little trouble
and cost.

There exists another special industry in its incip-
ient state among us, which might be regarded as
essentially Australian, and which also might be wide-
ly extended: I mean the gathering of seeds of many
kinds of Eucalyptus, and also of some Acacias and
Casuarinas, for commercial export. . No doubt the col-
lecting of seeds ‘is effected among the forest-trees of
any country, and very important branches of industry
these gatherings are, in very many localities abroad.
But what: gives to our own export trade of forest
seeds such significance is the fact that we offer thereby
means of raising woods with far more celerity and
ease than would be possible through dissemination of
trees from any other part of the globe, it being under-
stood that the operations are instituted in climatic
100 FOREST CULTURE AND

zones similar to our own. Trees with softer kinds of
woods, such as Poplars and Willows, even though they
may rival some of the Eucalypts in quickness of
growth, cannot be well drawn into comparison, as
most of them do not live in dry soil, nor attain lon-
gevity, nor assume gigantic dimensions, nor furnish
timber of durability. But there are still other rea-
sons: which have drawn our Eucalypts into extensive
cultural use elsewhere — for instance, in Algeria,
Spain, Portugal, Italy, the south of France, Greece,
Egypt, Palestine, various uplands of India, the savan-
nahs of North America, the Nanas of South America,
at Natal and other places in South Africa, and even
as near as New Zealand.* One of the advantages
offered is the extraordinary facility and quick-
ness with which the seeds are raised, scarcely any
care being requisite in nursery works; a seedling,
moreover, being within a year, or even less time, fit
for final transplantation. ‘Another advantage consists
in the ease with which the transit can be effected,
in consequence of the minuteness of most kinds of
Eucalyptus seeds,} there being, besides, no difficulty
in packing on account of the natural dryness of these
seeds. For curiosity’s sake I had an ounce of the
seed of several species counted, with the following
results:—

Blue Gum-tree, one ounce—sifted fertile seed grains.... 10,112

Stringy-bark tree (unsifted) .... 20... cceeeeeee seers 21,080
Swamp Gum-tree (unsifted)...... 0... cc00 sees eee eee 23,264
Peppermint Eucalypt (unsifted). .............e02e002-+ 17,600

 

* The seeds of Eucalyptus rostrata (our Red Gum-tree) are available for
all tropic countries, inasmuch as this species, which is almost incomparas
bly valuable for its lasting wood, ranges naturally right through the hot
zone of Australia,

t The seeds of the West Australian Red Gum-tree (Eucalyptus calophyila)
and the East Australian Bloodwood-tree (Eucalyptus corymbosa) are coms
paratively large and heavy. :
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 101

According to this calculation we could raise from one
pound of seeds of the Blue Gum-tree one hundred and
sixty-one thousand seven hundred and ninety-two
plants. Let us suppose, for argument’s sake, that only
‘half the seeds of such grew, the number of seedlings
would be enormous; and even if only the seedlings
of one quarter of the seeds of one pound finally were
established, they would suffice, in the instance of the
Blue Gum-tree, to cover four hundred and four acres,
assuming that we planted at the rate of one hundred
trees to the acre (allowing for thinning out). The fol-
lowing notes, for comparison, may be of interest:

One ounce of: Contains Grains.
Pinus pimaster. .... cee. cece cece ccee ce ceee cece cess cece 780
Pinus: pinea: veces soos ages wows sews sees sees view vows ae ve 33
Pinus halepponsis ......60 cess cece ceee cece ecte esse ces 940
Pints: GOA sacescs aietwosssecaeee wie hte ese dese sess te0el0,080
Cupressus SCMPervirens .... 6... sees cree eee cece cece eee 4,970
Fraxinus OMS. ..0. .0c- eee cece cece cece cece cece cceeee S16
Bettilaal bates os wicecsccie ica Gita an sais) ein ae 6" eeieiae- 34,560
Acer pseudoplatanus...... 0.0. cess seen vee esgueaaee aoa 183

It seems marvellous that trees of such colossal di-
mensions, counting among the most gigantic of the
globe, should arise from a seed-grain so extremely
minute.

The exportation of Eucalyptus-seeds has already as-
sumed some magnitude. Our monthly mails conveyed
occasionally quantities to the value of over £100; the
total export during the past twelve years must have
reached several or, perbaps, many thousand pounds
sterling. For the initiation of this new resource, by
his extensive correspondence abroad, the writer can
lay much claim; and he believes that almost any
quantity of Eucalyptus-seeds could be sold in markets
102 FOREST CULTURE AND

of London, Paris, Calcutta, San Francisco, Buenos
Ayres, Valparaiso and elsewhere, as it will be long
before a sufficient local supply can be secured abroad
from cultivated trees.

Monsieur Prosper Ramel, of Paris, stands foremost
among those who promoted Eucalyptus culture in
South Europe.

Facts, such as just alluded to, may give an idea
with what ease the Eucalyptus can be disseminated
over extensive areas. Although the first cost of seeds,
or the facilities for their transit, preservation, and
germination, can only enter to a small extent into
consideration, when an object so important as that of
raising or restoring forests is to be attained, yet the
data thus far given in reference to some of the best
Eucalypts cannot but tend toward encouragement of
culture here and abroad. Indeed, among nearly all
the trees of the globe, most of our Eucalypts, together
with species of the allied genera —tristania, ango-
phora, melaleuca and metrosideros — produce seeds
the most minute and the most copious. The seeds of
the Birches, and of most species of ficus are, however,
also remarkably light and numerous.

Atsaw-mills and splitters’ establishments, the gath-
ering of seeds, particularly through the aid of chil-
dren, might be carried on most conveniently and most
inexpensively, the sums realized therefrom being clear
gain. The same may be said of collecting the abun-
dant gum-resins of various Eucalypts, which, for
medicinal and technologie purposes, are now in much
demand forexport. Purchasers in the city offer about
one shilling per pound. The liquid (very astringent)
exudations of the Eucalypts are also salable. The
BUCALYPTUS TREES. 108

precise quantity of tannic substance to be obtained
from saplings and foliage of various Eucalgpts, acacice
and casuarine remains yet unascertained ; but it is
likely large enough to base on their yield of tannic
acid special forest industries,

For belts of shelter-plantations, again, no country
in the warm temperate or subtropic zone could choose
trees of easier growth, greater resistance, rapidity of
increment, early and copious seeding, contentedness
with poor soil, and yet valuable wood for various pur-
poses, than some of the Australian acacie and casua-
rinse. They exceed much in quickness of growth the
coast shelter-pines of South Europe, Pinus haleppen-
sis and Pinus pinaster, but are not all equally lasting.
The trade in seeds of this kind is also not unimpor-
tant, and the sources of it are, at least partly, in our
sylvan land.

Still another forest industry might be viewed as
especially Australian, namely, the supply of Fern-trees
for commercial exportation. Though about one hun-
dred and fifty kinds of Fern-trees are now known,
they are mostly children of tropical or subtropical
countries, and these, again, nearly all restricted to the
humid jungles or the shady valleys meandered by for-
est brooks. Very few species of these noble plants
extend to a zone so cool as that of Victoria, Tasma-
nia, and New Zealand. Again, among this very lim-
ited number, the stout and large Dicksonia antartica
is not only one of the tallest of all the Fern-trees of
the globe, but certainly also the most hardy, and the
one which best of all endures a transit through great
distances. Indeed, a fresh, frondless stem, even if
weighing nearly half a ton, requires only to be placed,
104 FOREST CULTURE AND

without any packing, in the hold of a vessel as ordi-.
nary goodg, to secure the safe arrival in Europe,* the
vitality being fully thus retained for several months,
particularly if the stem is occasionally moistened, and
- kept free from the attacks of any animals. Through
my unaided exertions these hardy Fern-trees becaine,
like many other of our resources, fully known in
many countries ; and, while their value became estab-
lished, a market for them has now. been gained. I
would, however, not countenance the vandalism of
denuding every one of our Fern-glens of its pride, as,
even with all care, in half a century the pristine grand-
eur of the scenery could not be restored; yet, when
we consider that hundreds of gullies are teeming with
these magnificent plants, we can well afford to render
them accessible also to all the conservatories of the
winterly north, in order that the inhabitants there
may indulge in admiration of such superb forms of
vegetable life, even though a Fern-tree group in a
glass house can convey but a very inadequate idea of
the wild splendor of our Fern ravines. Not without
pain I have seen constructed the base of whole tram-
way lines in some of our forest-gullies, almost exclu-
sively of Fern-trees, for the conveyance of timber. A
watchful Forest Board would prevent such sacrifice,
and would save also the tall Palm-trees of East Gipps
Land from sharing the fate of those princely trees at
Illawarra and elsewhere. [Since writing this, our
Livistonas or Fan-palms have been protected by Gov-
ernment interdiction ; the law forbids also the indis-
criminate removal of Red Gum-trees from the banks of
the Murray River. In Queensland, every bunya-

 

: * No Fern-tree is indigenous to Europe.
™

EUCALYPTUS TREES. 105

bunya tree and native nut-tree is secured against be-
ing felled. The very local and circumscribed Kauri
forests, known only in two limited spots, would also
need some protection.‘| To the facilities of exporting
the huge, square Todea Ferns—a commerce initiated
by myself—I alluded on a former occasion.

Having dwelt on some of the technologic or mer-
cantile products obtainable from the native forests—
few, it is truae—I now pass on to some brief observa-
tions in reference to enriching the resources of our
woods.

Among new industries which, by introduction from
abroad, are likely to be pursued in sylvan localities,
that of the cultivation of the Tea shrub of China and
Assam stands, perhaps, foremost. Itis a singular fact
that even in the genial clime of Southern Europe, and
under advantages of inexpensive labor, the important
and lucrative branch of Tea-culture has received as yet
noattention whatever. This is probably owing to the
circumstance that hitherto the laborious manual pro-
cess of curling the fresh Tea-leaves under moderate
heat has never yet been superseded by adopting for
the purpose rollers worked and heated by steam,
though such contrivance was suggested here by me
many years ago.

The tea thus obtained could always be brought to
its best aroma by such a mode of exact control over
the degree and duration of the heat. Tea-culture in
the ranges would show us which soil, or which geo-
logic formation, produced here the best leaves. The
yield of the latter would, in the equable air of the hu-
mid air of the forest-glens, be far more copious than
106 FOREST CULTURE AND

the harvests which we obtain from the tea-bushes
planted in poor soil or exposed localities near the
metropolis, while localities in the ranges are often not
accessible to ordinary cereal culture. But I do not
speak of Tea cultivation as an ordinary field industry,
but rather as a collateral occupation in forest-culture
of the lower ranges.

Foreseeing the likelihood that this branch of rural
culture would be adopted in many favorable warm
spots of this colony, I have distributed, during the
past dozen years, the Tea- bush rather extensively
among country residents, partly with the view of
directing attention to a plant which, even for the
sake of ornamental value, is so eligible and easily
grown; partly with an intention of seeing thus inde-
pendent local supplies of seed forthcoming. In the
same way the Cork Oak was very generally distributed
by myself, in order that their acorns might, in due
time, become locally accessible in very many places.

The tea, in its commercial form, will however,
here, not likely be manufactured by the grower. It
is more probable that whenever plantations are formed.
in any forest region, an enterprising man will estab-
lish amidst the tea-farms a factory for preparing the
tea-leaves, and purchase the latter from the produc-
ers. This is the system by which, in many parts of
South Europe, the multitude of small lots of silk-
cocoons pass into the central reeling establishments ;
and this is the manner in which, from numerous peas-
ants, the beet-root is obtained for the supply of sugar
factories. In the same way the branches of the Su-
mach, a shrub which, with care, could be reared in
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 107

our ranges, would be rendered saleable at a central
sumach mill.* The demand for tea being so enor-
mous, and geographic latitudes like ours being those
which allow of its growth, it will be fully apparent
that it must assume a prominent part in our future
rural economy, particularly as the return for capital
and labor thus invested and expended will be quite
as early as that from the vine. The importation of
tea into Victoria, during 1870, has been valued in
the customs returns at £496,623; whereas Victoria
might largely export this highly important and remu-
nerative commodity.

The simple process of gathering the leaves might
be performed by children.

In the foregoing pages I alluded cursorily to the
Cork Oak ; let me add my opinion, that in any local-
ity with natural boundaries, such as abrupt sides of
ranges, deep water -courses, where fences could be
largely obviated, the Cork-tree might well be planted
as a forest-tree, and thus estates be established at lit-
tle cost, with hardly any expense of maintenance,
from which a periodic yield of cork might be obtained
for several successive generations. The investment
of a limited capital for raising a cork-forest in any
naturally-defined locality would, as I said, create a
rich possession for bequest. Even if by new inven-
tions an artificial substitute for cork was found, the
wood of the Cork Oak would still be of some value.
The State might also reserve any forest area with:
natural boundaries for its various wood requirements.

 

*An essay by Professor Inzenga, on Sumach-culture in Sicily, translated
by Colonel 8. Yule, C. B., is published in the Transactions of the Botanic
Society of Edinburgh, vol. ix., 341-355, and was, on my suggestion, trans
ferred to a local journal,
108 FOREST CULTURE AND

Many other cultural resources of forests are as yet
very inadequately recognized. The dye-saffron might
be grown as much for amusement as for the sake of its
pretty flowers, just as an ordinary bulb, wherever ju-
venile gatherers can be had. Equally lucrative might
be made the culture of another plant, the medicinal
colchicum, a gay Autumnal flowering bulb worthy of
a place in any garden. In apt forest spots both would
become naturalized. Amidst‘the forests, in thie glens
which skirt the very base of alpine mountains, on the
M’ Allister River, opium was produced without any toil,
almost as a play-work, to the value of £30, from an
acre. Mr. Bosisto, who, on that particular locality,
called forth this industry, found on analysis that the
Gipps Land opium proved one of the most powerful
on record, ten one hundredths of morphia being its
yield. Small samples of opium prepared in the Mel-
bourne Botanic Garden were exhibited some years ago
at the International Exhibition. The Hon. John Hood,
of this city, promoted much the opium industry in
this country by the extensive distribution of seeds of
the Smyrna poppy ; he found the yield here, in favor-
able seasons and by careful operation, to be from forty
to fifty pounds on an acre, worth at present thirty to
thirty - five shillings per pound. The value of the
opium imported into Victoria during 1870, according
to customs returns, was £150,681. The banks of many a
forest brook, and the slopes within reach of irrigation
from springs, might, doubtless, in numerous instances,
be converted into profitable hop-fields, the yield of hops
in Gipps Land having proved very rich. Mr. A. M.
M’Leod obtained, in one instance, fifteen hundred
pounds of hops from an acre of ground at Bairnsdale,
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 109

Messrs. A. W. Howitt, F. Webb, and D. Ballentine
had there also large returns from their hop-fields. As
an instance how large a revenue might be realized’
from forest land in various ways, quite irrespective of
wood supply, I adduce the fact that the income ob-
tained by the Forest Department of Hanover from the
mere gathering of fruit—chiefly bleeberries—amount-
ed to £21,750 during one of the late years. The Han-
overian forests comprise an area equal to the county
of Bourke, our metropolitan county, and occupy one
seventh of the territory. Speaking of Hanover, let
me add, that the laws promulgated this year in that
country render it compulsory on each district to line
its roads with trees, the widest distance allowed from
tree to tree being thirty feet; similar laws were in
force long since in other parts of Germany ; fruit-trees
are among the trees chosen for these lines. Would it
not therefore be advisable to naturalize along our forest
brooks and in our shady vales such plants as the rasp-
berry-bush, strawberry-plant, and others, which readily
establish themselves ? In one of my exploring tours,
when it fell to my lot to discover the remotest sources
and tributaries of the River Yarra, and to ascend first of
all Mount Baw Baw, I scattered the seeds of the large-
fruited Canada blackberry along the alpine springs;
and I have since learned that this delicious fruit is now
established on the rivulets of that mountain. We may
hear of equal successes of experiments which I else-
where instituted. The truffle, though not an article
of necessity, might be naturalized in many of our for-
ests, especially in soil somewhat calcareous. Would
any one imagine that during one recent year (1867)
the quantity collected in France was valued at £1,-

*6
110 FOREST CULTURE AND

400,000 (35,000,000 francs) ? The time allotted to
my address is not sufficient to add much to these
instances.

On various occasions I drew attention to the likeli-
hood of Peru-bark plants being eligible for culture in
the sheltered and warmer parts of our woods, inas-
much as in brush shades of the Botanic Gardens the
cinchone endured a temperature two or three degrees
under the freezing point. Last year Cinchona-plants
given by me to Mr. G. W. Robinson, of Hillesley,
near Berwick, for experiment, passed quite well
through the cool season without any cover. The
lowest temperature at Harmony Valley, Blackwoud
Gully, in the Dandenong Ranges, observed during
1866 by Mr. Jabez Richardson, who, on my request,
kindly undertook the thermometer readings there
during that year, was still one degree above the freez-
ing point, while the temperature at the Melbourne
Observatory sunk to twenty-eight degrees Fahren-
heit. Let me note, however, that simultaneously frost
occurred in the open flats of Dandenong ; hence the
great importance of forest shelter in cases like this.
East Gipps Land, with its mild temperature, is likely.
to prove the aptest part of the Victorian colony for
Peru-bark cultivation. Who does not remember the
deep grief into which a small insular colony sunk
within the last few years, when its population became
actually decimated by fever, and when, after one
hundred and fifty years of existence of that unhappy
colony, only just the first Cinchonas had been planted.

In some of the uplands of New South Wales, where
it was desirable to clear away bush vegetation—such,
for instance, in which Daviesias, or native hop, pre-
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 111

dominated —angoras proved very effectual for the
purpose. Doubtless there are many forest tracts where
this measure could be adopted with advantage to gain
grass pasture, without any injury being done to large
native trees; but the smaller trees are likely to suffer,
while the underwood might in many instances be
better utilized for potash or oil. At all events, goats
are, among pastoral animals, the most destructive to
vegetation, and much of the forests on the Alps of
Switzerland and Tyrol were destroyed by the indis-
criminate access given to goats. The Angora, with
its precious fleece, can therefore be located only in
some forest regions; it thrives, moreover, in the
desert.

I might allude, on this occasion, also to the great
productiveness of bees in our forests, the flowers of so
many of our native plants, and among them those of
the Eucalypts, being mellaginous—blossoms of some
kind or the other being available all the year round.
Cuba, with an area less than half that of Victoria,
exported, in the year 1849, so large a quantity of
honey as two millions and eight hundred thousand
pounds, and about one million pounds of wax. I be-
lieve the export has since increased. A forest inhab-
itant might devote a plot of ground near his dwelling
to the earth-nut or pea-nut, an originally Brazilian
plant, of which latterly about nine hundred thousand
bushels were produced annually in the United States
for the sake of its excellent table-oil. In Harper's
Magazine of 1870 it is stated that of the earth-nut, in
1869, not less than two hundred and thirty-five thou-
‘sand bushels were brought to New York. It is esti-
mated that Virginia, Tennessee, Georgia, and Carolina
112 FOREST CULTURE AND

have conjointly sent over one million bushels to mar:
ket in 1870. The yield, it is said, is from eighty to
one hundred and twenty bushels on an acre. The
seeds are slightly roasted for the table, or pressed for
a palatable oil. As much as ten shillings to twelve
shillings is paid for the bushel in New York. The
plant seems well eligible for forest-farms, particularly
in a somewhat calcareous soil. In the garden under
my control I have reared it with ease.

I intended to have spoken of the various imple-
ments especially designed for wood-cuiture ; but time
will not admit of it. Thus, merely by way of exam-
ple, I place before you one of those utensils — the
hohlborer, or, as it might be called, the ‘ bore-spade”’
—brought into use nearly fifty years ago by a scientific
forester, Dr. Heyer, of Giessen. Several thousand
plants of the Scotch Fir and of other pines can be lifted
with this bore-spade in a day by one forest laborer,
the object being that each seedling should retain a -
small earth-ball, to facilitate the success of the mov-
ing process. About ten thousand such seedlings are
conveyed at a time in a forest wagon.*

And yet, it must be confessed, our colony, with
others in the Australian group, has accomplished but
very little in any branch of sylvan maintenance, or
forest culture, or the advance of industrial pursuits
in our woodlands.

One precursory step, however, has been made, and
this is likely to be followed. I allude to the exten-
sive gratuitous distribution of plants to public grounds
in most parts of our colony—a distribution which has
teen in operation under the authority of Government

 

* Since this lecture was delivered a short account of the hore-s
appeared in the Melbourne Economist, " as ae
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 113

from ground under my control for the last twelve
years. JI should think it not unlikely that this rais-
ing of trees in masses will soon become also a special
object of attention to the railway department, within
its own areas, to re-supply its own wants,

While a divine may withdraw some of his slender
means, or a teacher may devote a share of his scanty
earning, to inclose the ground of his dwelling, with
a view of protecting a few trees on spots not really
their own, we may be sure that the authorities do
not wish to see hundreds of miles of railway fences
long left unutilized, so far as planting of trees is con-
cerned, particularly as such fences for this purpose
afford much ready inducement. The average width
of the railway area is two and a half chains, both on
the Ballarat and Echuca lines, therefore far wider
than that of European lines, and spacious enough for
tree plantations, at least of some kinds. The length
of the N. E. Railway line will be one hundred and
eighty-five miles, giving, consequently, three hundred
and seventy miles’ length for plantations. Theslower-
growing or less - lofty trees would there be on their
place, such as our Red Gum-tree, the Iron-bark-tree,
the W. A. Yarrah, the Blackwood-tree, the British
Oak, the Quebec and Live Oak, the Cork Oak, the
Elm, the Ash, the Totara, the Chestnut -tree, the
Walnut, the Hickory, and many others which do not
suffer from exposure ; for while the railway loan will
last for an indefinite period, the railway material,
such as the fences, sleepers, cars, will not last forever,
and for these the wood might thus inexpensively
become re-available in due time. Even where the
railway space is narrow the operation of lopping the
114 FOREST CULTURE AND

planted trees along its lines might most readily be
resorted to, and dangerous encroachments thereby be
avoided.

No one ever expected our most serviceable Railway
Department to be burdened with the additional heavy
task of entering on cultural pursuits, and I see no
way of attaining the object here specially indicated
unless purposely financial means and administrative
organizations were provided by the State.

In a special work (Die Bepfianzung der Eisenbahn
Damme, etc., by E. Lucas, second edition, 1870) the
methods adopted in Germany for utilizing the railway
dams, and the free space within railway fences, for
wood and fruit culture, is amply discussed. With
the increasing value of culture-land this question of
utilizing the spare ground along railways becomes
more and more important. Where the space proves
too narrow for rearing timber- trees, Hazel, Olives,
Figs, Mulberries, Almonds, Osiers, Sumach, Myall,

‘Ricinus, Blackberries, and such other lower trees or

bushes as require no great attention, could doubtless
be grown with profit. It might also be possible to
establish advantageously permanent hedges of Haw-
thorn, Opuntias, Osage Orange, and other not readily-
inflammable and easily-managed bushes. Luzern and
Sainfoin are much cultivated along continental rail-
way-lines as fodder-herbs.

In North America six hundred and fifty Walnuts
or Hickories are planted on an acre ; though standing
so close, they are worth twelve shillings in twenty
years for a variety of purposes. If wanted for heavy
timber or nuts, they are thinned out so as to keep
them twenty feet apart, This may serve as an indi-
EUCALYPTUS TREES, 115

cation how spare places on railways might be utilized.
Our regular and quick communication with California
is giving now easy opportunity for importing nuts of
the various American Hickories and Walnut-trees in
quantity ; while of the ordinary Persian Walnut-tree
seeds can already be obtained both here and in Tas-
mania. MResinous Pine-trees may possibly increase
any danger of conflagrations on railway-lines. Nur-
series for sowing seeds of hardy utilitarian trees might
at once be established on all the railway-stations at
comparatively little cost.

The only effective public effort hitherto made to
anticipate the necessities of forest culture consists in
the planting of public reserves, parks, church-yards,
school-grounds, cemeteries, and the area of many of
our public buildings. The trading horticulturists
have also largely aided in the importation and raising
of foreign trees.

In this effort, as already remarked, I took a promi-
nent share, or perhaps, in many instances, it origi-
nated from impulses or supports given by myself.

Undoubtedly, it was a primary object to cover the
dismal barrenness of public grounds, to help in miti-
gating thereby local dryness and heat, to afford shade
and shelter, and torender many a barren spot a pleas-
ing retreat.

But this was not my only object. I had a second,
and, to my mind, higher one in view.

I wished that, locally, many nuclei for forest cult-
ure should be formed ; that, within comparatively few
years, seeds should almost everywhere become avail-
able in masses from local tree-plantations ; and that
thus efforts now made for parks and pleasure-grounds
116 FOREST CULTURE AND

should be enlarged for creating more or less extensive
forests.

These ideas may, perhaps, excite some surprise,
yet I feel confident that they will and must be acted
on before, in frightful truthfulness, the terrors of a
woodless country in our zone, and settled with a fu-
ture dense population, will be encountered.

Should, however, ‘my warnings fail to impress the
public mind, then at least I have placed my views on
record, and should not be held responsible for inter-
ests, however vital, which the trust of my position
must largely bring under my reflection and care.

My effort in supplying merely material for raising
local plantations all over the colony is, however, but
the first step in a great national work of progress ;
and I think we may reflect, not without some pride,
that this public step was made in Australia here first
of all.

Halfa million of plants distributed by me to public
institutions is, after all, but a trifle in a country that
requires hundreds of millions of foreign trees, if it
really is to advance to greatness and the highest pros-
perity ; a greatness that will be retarded in the same
degree as attention to this, one of its most urgent in-
terests, is deferred.

The gifts of plants from the establishment under
my control have provided the country with many a
species that otherwise would not have existed here
yet. Many of the magnificent or quick-growing Him-
alayan and California Pines, not to speak of others,
became through my hand first dispersed by thousands
and thousands; and although I may have incurred
the displeasure of a few of the less thoughtful of my
EUCALYPTUS TREES, 117

fellow-citizens, who wished the slender means of my
young establishments appropriated for the ephemeral
glory of floral displays, and who wished to sacrifice
lasting progress to unproductive gaiety, yetI feel
assured that the fair feelings of the inhabitants of
Victoria in general will approve of the path of pre-
dominant utility which I struck out for myself, and
will respect the considerations which prompted me, in
an equitable spirit toward town and country, toattend
in the first instance to pressing necessities, leaving
the unnecessary or less useful for the exertions of a
later time.

If a census of the trees, which are to furnish us
much seed for forest culture, could be held all over
the colony, perhaps my early efforts would be viewed
with more justice and gratitude.

“ They did of solace treat,
And bathe in pleasure of the joyous shade,
Which shielded them against the broiling heat,
And with green bough decked the gloomy glade.”
SPENSER.

In passing through a demolished forest, how sad-
dening to us its aspect! What mind, capable of high-
er feelings, can suppress its sympathy, when we see
stretched and withering on the ground a princely tree
which but a few hours previously was an object of our
admiration and a living monument of magnificence
and glory. Do you think it had its enjoyment?
Does it send mere automatically, without animation
or sensibility of any kind, its crown to the sunny sky,
or drink joyless the pearly dew ? Do you think it
closes its flowers but mechanically, or unfolds them
again to imbibe light and genial warmth, absolutely
without gladness or pleasure of any kind? What is
118 FOREST CULTURE AND

vitality, and what mortal will measure the share of
delight enjoyed by any organism! Why should even
the life of a plant be expended cruelly and wastefully,
_especially if, perhaps, this very plant stood already in
youthful elegance, while yet the diprotodon (a wom-
bat of the size of a buffalo) was roaming over the for-
est ridges encircling Port Phillip Bay—when those
forest ridges on the very place of this city were still
clothed in their full natal garb. Do not assume that
I lean to transmutation doctrines ; or that to my un-
derstanding there is an uninterrupted transit from
the thoughts which inspire the mind to the faculties
of animals and to the vitality of plants! ‘Yet that
individual life, whatever it may be, which we often
so thoughtlessly and so ruthlessly destroy, but which
we never can restore, should be respected. Is it not
as if the sinking tree was speaking imploringly to us,
and when falling wished to convey to us its sadness
and its grief? Like the nomadic wanderer of the
Australian soil passed away before us, so I fear most
of the traces of our beautiful and evergreen forest
will be lost ere long.

5 . “It isa goodly sight to see
What heaven has done for this delicious land ;
What flowers of fragrance blush on every tree,
What glad’ning prospects o’er the hills expand !
But man would mar them with an impious hand.”
BYEon.

Beyond the plain utilitarian purposes of our forests
(some of which I endeavored briefly to explain), and
beyond all, the important functions which the woods
have to perform in the great economy of Nature, they
possess still other claims on our consideration, such as
ought to evoke some feeling of piety toward them,
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 119

It was in the forests where the poetic mind of Schil-
ler, during his early boyhood,* first of all awoke to
its deep love for nature; where his strong sense for
noble rectitude was formed ; where he framed his
ideals of all that is elevated and great. This influ-
ence of nature we see reflected in other lofty minds ;
it leads true genius on its luminous path. Contrast
the magnificence of a dense forest, before the de-
structive hand of man defaced it, with the cheerless
aspect of wide landscapes devoid of wooded scenery—
only open plains or treeless ridges bounding the hori-
zon. The silent grandeur and solitude of a virgin
forest inspires us almost with awe —much more so
than even the broad expanse of the ocean. It con-
veys, also, involuntarily to our mind a feeling as if
we were brought more closely before the Divine Pow-
er by whom the worlds without end were created,
and before whom the proudest human work must
sink into utter insignificance. No settlement, how-
ever princely — no city, however great its splendor,
brilliant its arts, or enchanting its pleasures — can
arouse those sentiments of veneration which, among
all the grand works of nature, an undisturbed noble
forest-region is most apt to call forth. I never saw
truly happier homes of unmingled contentedness than
in the seclusion of the woods. It is as if the bracing
pureness of the air, the remoteness from the outer
world, the unrestricted freedom from formal restraint,
give to forest-life a charm for which in vain we will
ever seek elsewhere. The forest inhabitant, as a rule,
sees his life prolonged ; an air of peace on all sides sur-
rounds him; even with less prosperity, he is glad to

 

* Sketch of the Life of Schiller, by Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton, p. 2,
120 FOREST CULTURE.

break away from the turmoils and enmities into which
elsewhere he is thrown by the bustle and struggle of
the world, and to seek again this calm retreat in forest
mountains, The existence of many an invalid might
be prolonged and rendered more enjoyable, while
many a sufferer might be restored to health, were he
to seek timely the patriarchal simplicity of forest-
life, and the pure air, wafted decarbonized in deli-
cious freshness through the forest, ever invigorating
strength, restoring exhilaration and buoyancy of his
mind. In this young country new lines of railway
are early to disclose some of the almost paradisic fea-
tures of sylvan scenery, hitherto known to most of us
only through the talent of illustrious landscape-paint-
ers of this city.

“ To sit on rocks, to muse o'er flood and fell ;
To slowly trace the forest’s shady scene,
Where things that own not man’s dominion dwell,
And mortal foot has ne’er or rarely been ;
To climb the trackless mountain, sJl unseen,
With the wild flock, that never need a fold ;
Alone o'er steep and foaming falls to lean—
This is not solitude : ‘tis but to hold
Converse with nature's charms, and view her stores untold.”
BYRON.

I regard the forest as an heritage given to us by
Nature, not for spoil or to devastate, but to be wisely
used, reverently honored, and carefully maintained.
I regard the forests as a gift, intrusted to any of us
only for transient care during a short space of time,
to be surrendered to posterity again as an unimpaired
property, with increased riches and augmented bless-
ings to pass as a sacred patrimony from generation to
generation,
ON THE

JPPLICATION OF PHYTOLOGY

TO THE

INDUSTRIAL PURPOSES OF LIFE.

A POPULAR DISCOURSE,

Delivered at the Industrial Museum of Melbourne, on
8a November, 1870,

By Ferdinand von Mueller, C.M.G,, M.D., Ph. D., F.R.S,

Comm. Ord., Santiago, Kn. of Orders of Austria, France, Prussia, Italy,
Wuertemberg, Denmark, Mecklenburg, Gotha; Government Botanist
for Victoria, and Director of the Botanic Gardens at Melbourne.

Called upon somewhat suddenly to choose the
theme for the discourse of this evening, I made my
choice unguardedly. I anticipated in my thoughts
how, during the intended instructive recreation of
this hour, the bearings of intimate botanic knowledge
on many an industrial pursuit might readily be dem-
onstrated by some impressive facts. But, on reflec-
tion, I saw myself at once surrounded by so varied
and bewildering a multitude of objects that to do jus.
tice in a few words to my theme became a hopeless
task. But while I offer this mere introductory ad-
dress for a series of lectures on the phytologic section
122 FOREST CULTURE AND

of this institution, we might learn by a rapid glance
over an area of knowledge singularly wide that only

through many successive discourses, explaining sub.
jects in detail, the student can become aware of the

importance of phytologic knowledge in its relation to

the industrial purposes of life. In all zones, except

the most icy, mankind depends on plants for its prin-
cipal wants. For our sustenance, clothing, dwellings,

or utensils ; for our means of transit, whether by sea
or land; indeed, for all our ordinary daily require-

ments, we have to draw the material largely, and

often solely, from the vegetable world. The resources

for all these necessities must be-—it cannot be other-

wise—manifold in the extreme, and singularly varied,

again, in different climatic zones, or under otherwise -
modified conditions.

To render, therefore, these vegetable treasures
accessible to our fullest benefit, not only locally, but
universally, must ever be an object of the deepest sig-
nificance. Increasing requirements of the human
races and augmented insight into the gifts of nature
render now-a-days quite imperative the closest appli-
ances of science to our resources and our daily wants.

“ Omnis tellus optima ferat !’’ has become the motto
of our Acclimatization Society ; or let me quote from
Virgil: ‘« Non omnis fert omnia tellus, hic segetes, illic
weniunt felicius uvae.”’ Striving to unite the products
of many lands, it suffices for us nowhere any longer
to discriminate among these resources with merely
crude notions; but it becomes necessary to fix accu-
rately, also, as far as plants are concerned, their indus-
trial value, trace their origin, test their adaptability,
investigate their productiveness, durability, qualities ;
EUCALYPTUS TREES, 128

and to reduce all these inquiries to a sound basis by
assigning to any species that position in the phyto-
logic system by which it can be recognized by any one
in any part of the globe. When the wants of phy-
toglaphy are satisfied we have to call to aid chemistry,
therapy, geology, culture, microscoptic investigation,
pictorial art, and other branches of knowledge, to
illustrate the respective value of the species, and the
degree of its importance to any particular community.
But in the discussions of one evening we can do no
more than to touch succinctly only on a few of those
vegetable objects most promising to our own colony
for introduction, or most accessible among those indig-
enous here; we may glance on them, also, with a
view of learning how their elucidation might practi-
cally be pursued, and the knowledge thus gained be
diffused. To aid in the latter aim the phytologic sec-
tion in the Industrial Museum is to be established ;
of the requirements of this section I shall say a few
passing words.

The products and educts of the vegetable world are
immense; any display of them in the order of sci-
ence, as intended for this museum, must carry with
it a permanency of impressive instruction which any
other modes of teaching, sure to be more ephemerous,
fail to convey. But these efforts at diffusing knowl-
edge should be seconded by means not inadequate to
a great object, and should be worthy of the dignity
and name of this rising country. Who would not
like to see the best woods of every country stored up
here in instructive samples—nearly a thousand kinds
alone to choose from, as far as our continent is con-
cerned ? Who would not wish to have here at hand
124 FOREST CULTURE AND

for comparison the barks, exudations, grains, drugs,
as raw material? Who would not desire to have
ready access to a series of oils, whether pressed or
distilled, whether from indigenous or imported plants ?
Who would not have it in his power to compare the
starches, dyes, casts of our luscious fruits, or the
paper- material, tars, acids, coals of various kinds,
fibers, alkaloids, and other medicinal preparations
from various plants ?

Why not place here a series of all the weapons and
implements, traced accurately to their specific origin ?
From such even in many instances we have learned,
through keen observations of the first nomadic occu-
pants of the soil, the use of many kinds of wood. All
these objects, crude or prepared in the multitudinous
way of their adaptations, ought to be accompanied,
wherever necessary, by full explanatory designations,
microscopic sections, and other means of elucidation ;
while the periodic issue of descriptive indices, detail-
ing still more copiously the derivation, uses, prepa-
ration, and monetary value of such objects, will enable
us to serve the full intentions for which this museum
section has been formed.

Lectures, however valuable, demonstrations, how-
ever instructive, cannot aldne form the path of exten-
sive industrial education ; most minds, indeed, prefer
to dwell tacitly on the objects of their choice, and
muse quietly about the adaptability of any of them
for operations or improvements in which they may
be specially interested.

How many inventions have received their first
impulse from an institution such as we wish to form !
Investigators, eminent in their profession, will doubt-
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 135

less unite here, sooner or later, to bring to bear the
sum of their knowledge, earned by a life-long toil, for
giving vitality to that information which is to enter
guidingly into the ordinary purposes of life. Thus,
the happiness and prosperity of our fellow-men should
be enhanced and exalted, and one of the loftiest ob-
jects of our striving after truths be fulfilled.

But the unassuming worker, conscious how far his
own honest intentions advanced beyond his best re-
sults, may well exclaim with Moore, in his soft melo-
dies :

**Ah | dreams too full of saddening truth,
Those mansions o’er the main
Are like the hopes I built in youth,
As eunny, and as vain!”

Let us first take a glance at one of our innumerable
forest glens. We see in the deep, rich detritus of
rocks and fallen leaves, accumulated in past centu-
ries some of the grandest features of the world’s veg-
etation. Fern-trees* rise, at least exceptionally, to
a height of eighty feet, higher, therefore, than any
other parts of the globe, unless in Norfolk Island.
Mammoth-Eucalypts abound, having, in elevation,
rivals only in the Californian Sequoia Wellingtonia ;
we may, indeed, obtain, from one individual tree,
planks enough to freight almost a ship of the tonnage
of the Great Britain. Todea Ferns, now sought in
trade, occur in these recesses, weighing, deprived of
their fronds, almost a ton ; and, if the Xanthorrhceas
do resemble, as popularly thought, our once spear-
armed natives, then the Todea stems bear certainly
as justly a resemblance to large black bears, as has
bee@ comically contended. The Fan Palms,+ though

 

* Alsophila Australis, R. Br.
+t Corypha (Livistona) Australis, R. Br,
7
126 FoREStT cULTURH AND

only occurring in East Gipps Land, within our terri-
tory, rank among the most lofty of the globe, though
also among the most hardy. All this, in our latitude,
seem astounding — but more, it demonstrates, also,
great riches; and I allude to it here only because I
wished to show how a vegetation so prodigious points
to the facilities of a natural, magnificent, industrial
eulture. The complex of vegetation is always an in-
dicator of the soil and climate ; as such alone, plants
deserve close study. In this instance it reveals un-
told treasures, and yet, without phytographic knowl-
edge they could never be understood, nor any intelli.
gent appreciation of them be conveyed beyond the lo-
cality.

But can this grand picture of nature not be further
embellished? Might not the true Tulip-tree, and the
large Magnolias of the Mississippi and Himalaya,
tower far over the Fern-trees of these valleys, and
widely overshade our arborescent Labiatae ?* Might
not the Andine Wax Palm, the Wettinias, the Gin-
gerbread Palm, the Jubea, the Nicau, the northern
Sabals, the Date, the Chinese Fan Palms, and Rhapis
flabelliformis, be associated with our Palm in a glori-
ous picture? Or, turning to still more utilitarian ob-
jects, would not the Cork-tree, the Red Cedar, the
Camphor-tree, the Walnuts and Hickories of North
America, grow in these rich, humid dales, with very
much greater celerity than even with all our tending
in less genial spots? Could not, of four hundred co-
niferous trees, and three hundred sorts of Oaks, nearly
every one be naturalized in these ranges, and €hus

 

* Rhododendron arboreum attains a height of thirty feet, while Rh, Fal-
coneri rises to fifty feet, with leaves half a yard long.
EUCALYPTUS TREES, 127

deals, select tanning material, cork, pitch, turpentine,
and many other products be gained far more readily
there than elsewhere in Victoria, from sources ren-
dered ourown? Ought we not to test in these val-
leys how far the Sisso, the Sal, the Teak, may prove
hardy, and as important here as our Blackwood and
Eucalypts abroad? Or shall I enumerate all the orna-
mental woods for furniture, Machinery, instruments,
which form an endless array of genera, and species
might be chosen as introducable, indeed, from most
lands ; many of these, perhaps, to find an asylum in our
mountains before—like in St. Helenaand other isolated
spots—the remarkable and endemic trees are swept
by man’s destructive agency from the face of the
globe ? Shall I speak in detail of the trees which
yield dyes, and many medicinal substances ? If the
Turkey Box- tree should continue the best for the
wood-engraver, it would, in these valleys, assume its
largest dimensions. I do not hesitate in affirming
that out of ten thousand kinds of trees, which proba-
bly constitute the forests of the globe, at least three
thousand would live and thrive in these mountains
of ours; many of them destined to live through cen-
turies, perhaps, not a few through twice a thousand
years, as great historic monuments. Within the
railway-fences, hitherto in this respect unused, trees
might be raised as materials for restoring, locally, the
sleepers, posts, and rails, prior to their decay. The
principles of physiology, the revelations of the micro-
scope, aud the results of chemical tests guide us, not
only in our selections of the trees, but often teach us,
beforehand, the causes and reasons of durability or de-
cay.
i128 FOREST CULTURE AND

The longevity of certain kinds of trees is marvel-
ous. British Oaks are estimated to attain an age of
two thousand years. The Walnut- tree, the Sweet
Chestnut, and Black Mulberry-tree, live through many
centuries, if cared for. Wellingtonias are found to be
one thousand one hundred years old, Eventhe South
European Elm, which, since the time of the Romans,
has also made Britain its home, is known to stand six
hundred years. Dr. Hooker regards the oldest Ce-
dars yet existing, at Mount Lebanon, as two thousand
five hundred years old. Historic records are extant
of Orange-trees having attained an age of seven hun-
dred years, yet aged trees continue in full bearing,
under favorable circumstances ; a single tree is said
to have yielded, in a harvest, twenty thousand oran-
ges. Individual Olive-trees are also supposed to
have existed ever since the Christian era. The Ku-
ropean Cypres3, the British Yew, the Ginkgo, and the
Kauri afford other remarkable instances of longevity.

The Date-Palm gratefully bears its rich crop of fruit
for two hundred years. The Dragon-tree of Orotava
is another familiar example of extraordinary longevi-
ty. Here, in Victoria, the native Beech, and several
Eucalypts are veritable patriarchs of the forests, and of
a far more venerable age than is generally supposed.

So much for the lasting of some of our work, to en-
courage planting operations.

If Cook, who stepped with the pride of an explorer
on these shores precisely a century ago, could view
once more the scene of his discoveries, he would be
charmed by the sight of noble cities, and the happy
aspect of rural industry; but he would turn his eyes
in dismay from the desolation and aridity which a
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 129

merciless sacrifice of the native forests has already so
sadly brought about—a sacrifice arising from an utter
absence of all thoughts for the future. Ever since an-
tiquity this work of forest destruction has gone on in
every country, until, sooner or later, such reckless
improvidence has been overtaken by a resentful Ne-
mesis, in hindering the progress of national prosper-
ity, and the comfort of whole communities.

After lengthened periods of toil there partially arose,
but partially only, what an early guardianship might
have readily retained for most countries. When I
largely shared in the labors of establishing, for Aus-
tralian trees, a reputation abroad, I certainly did, also,
entertain a hope to awaken here, likewise, a univer-
sal interest in the dissemination of an almost endless
number of trees from the colder and subtropic girdles
of the whole globe. (Vide Phil. Inst., 1858, pp. 98 to
109.) A few scattered trees are of no national mo-
ment. We want the massive upgrowth of the Pitch-
pines, just as on the Pine barrens of the United States ;
we want whole forests of the Deal Pines, both cis and
transatlantic ; we want over all our mountains the
Silver Fir, already the charm of the ancients; we
want the Australian Red Cedar, scarcely any longer
existing in its native haunts; we want the Yarrah-
tree, forest-like, as in West Australia ; we want the
various elastic Ash-trees, which are so easily raised ;
we want, indeed, no end of other trees, because the
greater part of Victoria is ill- wooded ; because our
climate is hot and dry ; because extensive coal layers
we have not yet found. What practical bearing can
all the teaching in this hall, all the display in this mu-
seum, really exercise, if, finally, the artisan finds him:
180 FOREST CULTURE AND

self without an adequate and inexpensive material for
his work? Annually, the timber of one hundred and
fifty thousand acres is cut away in the United States
to supply the want for railway-sleepers alone. The
annual expenditure there in wood, for railway build-
ings and.cars, is £7,600,000. In a single year the lo-
comotives of the United States consume £11,200,000
of wood. The whole wood industries of the United
States represent, now, an annual expenditure of one
hundred million sterling. There, forty thousand arti-
sans are engaged alone in woodwork. Here, in Vic-
toria, notwithstanding the activity of many saw-mills,
we imported, only last year, timber to the value of
£270,572 for our own use. As these remarks may
find publicity, I have appended further notes on tim-
ber-trees, eminently desirable for massive introduc-
tion, but do not wish to exhaust by details the pa-
tience of this audience.

But it would be vain to expect that Europe and
America will continue forever to furnish for us their
timber. The constantly-increasing population and the
augmented requirements of advancing industries will
render no longer yonder woods accessible also to us
before the century passes, because even in those north-
ern countries the timber supply will then barely sat-
isfy local wants.

An idea may be formed of forest value when we
enter on some calculations of the supply of timber or -
other products available from one of our largest Eu-
calyptus-trees. Suppose one of the colossal Eucalyp-
tus amygdalina at the Black Spur was felled, and its
total height ascertained to be four hundred and eighty
feet, its circumference toward the base of the stem
,

EUCALYPTUS TREES. 131

eighty-one feet, its lower diameter to be twenty-six
feet, and at the height of three hundred feet its diam-
eter six feet. Suppose only half the available wood
was cut into planks of twelve inches width, we would
get, in the terms of the timber trade, four hundred
and twenty-six thousand seven hundred and twenty
superficial feet at one inch thickness, sufficient to cover
nine and three fourths acres. Thesame bulk of wood
cut into railway-sleepers, six feet by six inches by
eight inches, would yield in number seventeen thou-
sand seven hundred and eighty. Not less than a
length of twenty-three miles of three-rail fencing,
including the necessary posts, could be constructed.
It would require a ship of about one thousand tonnage
to convey the timber and additional firewood of half
the tree; and six hundred and sixty-six drayloads at
one and one half tons would thus be formed to remove
half the wood. The essential oil obtainable from the
foliage of the whole tree may be estimated at thirty-
one pounds; the charcoal, suppose there was no loss
of wood, seventeen thousand nine hundred and fifty
bushels ; the crude vinegar, two hundred and twenty-
seven thousand two hundred and sixty-nine gallons ;
the wood-tar, thirty-one thousand one hundréd and
fifty gallons ; the potash, two tons eleven hundred
weight. But how many centuries elapsed before un-
disturbed nature could build up by the subtle process-
es of vitality these huge and wondrous structures!
Some feelings of veneration and reverence should
also be evinced toward the native vegetation, where
it displays its rarest and grandest forms. It is la-
mentable that in all Australia scarcely a single spot
132 FOREST CULTURE AND

has been secured * for preserving some relics of its
most ancient trees to convey to posterity an idea of
the original features of our primeval forests. Though
it may appear foreign to my subject, I cannot with-
hold also on this occasion an imploring word, more
particularly when I notice land - proprietors in East
Australia to hold not even sacred a single native
Banyan-tree, which required centuries for building
its expansive dome and its hundreds of columnar pil-
lars ; nor to allow a single Cyrtosia Orchid to continue
with its stem trailing to the length of thirty feet, and
to remain with its thousands of large, fragrant blos-
soms, the pride of the forest. That very Cyrtosia
gives a clue to the affinity and structure of other plants
not nearer to us than Java ; and its destruction, with
probably -that of many others which the naturalist
forever is now prevented to dissect, or the artist to
delineate, or the museum custodian to preserve, will
be a loss to systematic natural history, also, forever.
Again, in a spirit of Vandalism, a Fan-Palm, after a
hundred years’ growth, is no longer allowed to raise
its slender stem and lofty crown in our own forests of
Gipps Land, simply because curiosity is prompted to
obtain a dishful of Palm-Cabbage at the sacrifice of a
century’s growth.

Let it be remembered that the uncivilized inhabit-
ants of many a tropical country know how to respect
the original and not always restorable gifts of a boun-
tiful Providence. They will invaribly climb the Palm-

 

* On the River Hastings some magnificent dales have been lately protected
by the Government of New South Wales for the sake of the incomparably
beautiful and grand native vegetation, an example deserving extensive imi-
tation. The forests of the Bunya Araucaria, occupying only a limited naty-
Tal area, gre also secured against intrusion by the Government, :
on EUCALYPTUS TREES. 183

tree to obtain its nuts or to plait its leaves; so, also
a resident in our forests might obtain from a grove
of our hardy Palms, if still any are left in this land of
Canaan, an annual income by harvesting the séeds as
one of the most costly articles of horticultural export.

Speaking of Palms, let me observe that the tall
Wax Palm of New Granada (Ceroxlyon andicola)
extends almost to the snow-line. It is néedless to
add that we might grow this magnificent product of
andine vegetation in many localities of the country
of our own adoption. Each stem yields annually
about twenty-five pounds of a waxy, resinous coat-
ing, which when melted together with tallow forms
an exquisite composition for candles. Chamerops
Fortunei, a-‘Chinese Fan Palm of considerable height,
is here hardy, like in South Europe; so would be, prob-
ably, the Gingerbread Palm (Hyphaene Thebaica).
Of the value of some Palms we may form an appreci-
ation when we reflect that Elais Guineensis, which
at the end of this century should be productive in
Queensland and North-west Australia, yields from
the fleshy outer portion of its nut the commercially
famed Palm-oil, prepared much in the manner of
Olive-oil; the value of this African Palm-oil import-
ed in 1861 into England was two millions sterling,
the demand for it for soap manufacture, and railway
engines-and carriages, being enormous.* The Chilean
Jubaea or Coquito Palm grows spontaneously as far
south as the latitude of Swan Hill, and is rich ina
melliginous sap.t A Date Palm planted now would
still be in full bearing two hundred years hence.

 

#The import of Palm-oil into Britain during 1868 was nearly a million
cwt. (960.059 cwt.). : :
+ Each tree yields ninety gallons of sap at a time, used for the preparation
of palm-honey.
"y
184 FOREST CULTURE AND

When hopeful illusion steps beyond the stern reali-
ties of the day, it cannot suppress a desire that en-
lightened statesmanship will always wisely foresee the
absolute requirements of future generations. The
colonist who lives in enjoyment of his property near
the ranges and sees a flourishing family growing up
around him, asks ominously what will be the aspect
of these forests at the end of the century, if the pres-
ent work of demolition continues to go on? He feels
that though the forests not solely bring us the rain,
through forests only a comparatively arid country can
have the full advantage of its showers, as bitter ex-
perience has taught generation after generation since
Julius Cesar’s time. The colonist reflects with appre-
hension that while no year nor day, when passed into
eternity, can be regained, no provision whatever is
made for the coming population, in whose welfare,
perhaps as the head of a family, and perhaps even
bearing political responsibility, he is interested. He
would gladly co-operate in the labors of a local Forest
Board, just like members of Road Boards and Shire
Councils enter cheerfully on the special duties alloted
to their administration. His local experience would
dictate the rules under which in each district the tim-
ber and other products of the forest could be most
lucratively utilized without desolation for the future ;
and he would be best able to judge, and to seek advice
how the yield of the forest could be advantageously
maintained, and its riches methodically be increased.
All this will weigh more heavily on bis mind when he
is cognizant that even in Middle Europe, in countries
so well provided with coals, and of a much cooler
clime than ours, the extent of the forests is kept scru-
HUCALYPTUS TREES. 135

pulously intact, and their regular yield remains secur-
ed from year to year and from century to century.
He would rest satisfied if only the trifling revenue
of the forests could be applied by him and his neigh-
bors to an inexpensive restoration of the woods con-
sumed. He would delight in seeing the leading for-
eign timber trees disseminated with our own Red
Gum-tree, Red Cedars, Yarrahs or Blackwoods, not
by hundreds but in time to come by millions, well
aware that the next generations may either censure
reproachfully the shortcomings of their ancestors, or
may point gratefully to the results of an earnest and
well-sustained foresight of future wants. As a first
step, at least in each district a few square miles should
be secured for subsequent forest nurseries in the best
localities, commanding irrigation by gravitation, and
ready access also, before it is too late, and all such
spots are permanently alienated from the Crown.
Physical science must yet largely be called to our
experimental aid before we can dispel the many crude
notions in reference to the effect of forest vegetation
on climate in all its details. It is thusa startling fact,
as far as experiments under my guidance hitherto
could elucidate the subject, that on a sunny day
the leaves of our common Hucalypts and Casuarinas
exhale a quantity of water several times, or even
many times, larger than those of the ordinary or
South European Elm, English Oak, or Black Poplar ;
while from the foliage of our native Silver Wattle
only half, or even less than half, the quantity of
water is evaporated than from the Poplar or Oak.
This degree of exhalation, so different in various
trees, depends on the number, position, and size of
136 FOREST CULTURE AND

their stomata, and stands in immediate correlation to
the power of absorption of moisture. Besides, if the
evaporation of Eucalyptus-trees is so enormous during
heat, and if the often horizontal roots of these trées
thus rénder soil around them very dry, in consequence
of the copious conveyance of moisture to the air,
they simultaneously, by the rapidity of their evapo-
ration in converting aqueous to gaseous liquid, or
water into vapor, cause a lowering of the temperature
most important in our climate during the months of
extreme heat, while their capability of absorbing
moisture during rain or from humid air must be com-
mensurately great.

It is beyond the scope of this address to dwell fur-
ther on facts like these ; but I was anxious to demon-
strate by a mere example how much we have yet to”
learn by patient research before we will have recog-
nized in all its details the important part which forest
vegetation plays in the great economy of nature.
Concerning forest culture, I would very briefly allude
to an instance showing how, by the teachings of natu-
ral science and thoughtful circumspection, the rewards
of industrial pursuits may become surprisingly aug-
inented. In the uplands of the Madras Presidency,.
«an ingenious method has been adopted in gathering
the harvest of Cinchona-bark, in recent very extensive
plantations, by removing it in strips without destroy-
ing the cambium layer. Then, by applying moss to
the denuded part of the stem, not only is the remov-
ed portion of the bark renewed within a year, to the
thickness of three years’ growth, but the protection
of the tender bark against the influence of light and
air allows nearly all the quinine and other alkaloids
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 187

to remain retained in the cortical layer without de-
composition, while in the ordinary three years’ bark
half or more of these principles is lost.

Facts like these lead us to appreciate the important
bearings of the natural sciences on all branches of in-
dustry ; but they warn us, also, to pause before we
give our further consent to the unlimited and reckless
demolition of our most accessible forest lands, on the
maintenance of which so many of our industries de-
pend. :

Just as it required, even under undisturbed favor-
able influences, centuries before our forest riches were
developed to their pristine grandeur, so it will need,
in the ordinary laws of nature, at least an equal
lengthened period before we can see towering up again
the sylvan colosses, which eminently contributed to
the fame of the natural history of this land—if, indeed,
the altered physical condition of the country will ren-
der the restoration of the trees on a grand scale. possi-
ble at all. .

Has -science drawn in vain its isothermal girdles
around the globe, or has the searching eye of the
philosopher in vain penetrated geologic structure, or
in vain the exploring phytographer circumscribed the
forms ? Well do we know what and where to choose;
botanic science steps in to define the objects of our
choice, which other branches of learning teach us to
locate and rear.

The Tea would as thriftly luxuriate in our wooded
valleys as in its native haunts at Assam, and yield a
harvest far more prolific than away from the ranges.
Indeed, we may well foresee that many forest slopes
will be dotted in endless rows with the bushes of the
188 FOREST CULTURE AND

Tea, precisely as our drier ridges are verdant with the
vine. Erythroxylon-Coco, the wondrous stimulating
plant of Peru, should be raised in the mildest and
most sheltered forest glens, where the stillness of the
air excludes the possibility of cutting frosts. Hop,
cultivated as a leading industry in Tasmania since a
quarter.of a century, will also take a prominent place
on the brooks of our mountains, Peru-bark trees of
various kinds should in spots so favored be subjected
to culture trials. How easily could any swampy de-
pression, not otherwise readily of value, be rendered
productive by allowing plants of the handsome New
Zealand flax lily quietly to spread as a source for fu-
ture wealth. How far the demand of material for
industrial purposes may quickly exceed the supply
may be strikingly exemplified by the fact that hun-
dreds of vessels are exclusively employed for bringing
the Esparto grass (not superior to several of our most
frequent sedges) from Spain to England, to augment
the supply of rags for the endless increasing require-
ments of the paper-mills. Conversion of manifold
material, even saw-dust, into paper, is carried on to a
vast extent ; a multitude of samples placed here be-
fore you will help to explain how wide the scope for
paper material may extend. But the factories want
material, not only cheap, but readily convertible, and
adapted to particular working.

In all these selections, a few glances through the
microscope, and the result of a few chemical reactions
taught in this hall, may at once advise the artisan in
his choice.

Phytologic inquiry is further to teach us rationally
the nature of maladies to which plants are subject,
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 189

just as it discloses even the sources of many of the
most terrific and ravaging diseases of which the
human frame is the victim. The microscope, that
marvelous tool for discovery, has become, also, the
guardian of many an industry. The processes of
morbid growth, or the development and diffusion of
the minute organism, between which descriptive bota-
ny knows how to discriminate, are thus traced out as
the subtle and insidious causes which at times involve
losses that count by hundreds of thousands in a single
year, even in our yet small communities. But while
the microscope discloses the form and development
of the various minute organisms which cause, through
the countless numbers of individuals, at times the
temporary ruin of many branches of rural industry, it
leaves us not helpless in ourinsight how to vanquish
the invaders. In correctly estimating the limits of
the specific forms, calling forth or concomitant with
some of the saddest human maladies, phytography
shares in the noble aim of alleviating human suffer-
ings, or restoring health and prolonging vital exist-
ence.

But it comes most prominently within the scope of
this Industrial Museum to delineate for the agricul-
tural and forest section, in explanatory plates, the
morbid processes under which crops and timber may
succumb, and an industry be paralyzed or a country
be verily brought to famine ; it devolves on us, also,
simultaneously to explain the effect of remedial agents,
such as sound reasoning from inductive science sug-
gests or confirms. To array samples of all field
products which our genial clime allows us to raise
is doubtless the object of an instructive institution,
140 FOREST CULTURE AND

more particularly in a young country, to which im-
migration streams mainly from a colder zone; but
this display of increased capabilities, and of more
varied products of a mostly winterless land, may
entice the inexperienced to new operations without
guarding him against failures. I should even like to
see tables of calculations in this Museum, from which
could be learned the yield and value of any crop with-
in a defined acreage and from a soil chemically exam-
ined; but from this I would regard inseparable a close
calculation of the costs under which each particular
crop can only be raised. Unfortunately, surprising
data are often furnished concerning the productive-
ness of new plants of culture ; but it is as frequently
forgotten that the large yield is, as a rule, dependent
on an expenditure commensurately large.

Among the most powerful means for fostering phy-
tologic knowledge for local instructive purposes, that
of forming collections of the plants themselves remains
one of the foremost. No school of any great preten-
sion should be without a local collection of museum
plants, nor should any mechanics’ institute be without
such. It serves as a means of reference most faith-
fully; it need not be a source of expenditure; it
might be gathered as an object of recreation ; it may
add even to the world’s knowledge. Through the
transmission of numbered duplicate sets of plants to
my office the accurate naming may be secured.*. From
such a normal collection in each district the inhabit-

 

* Parcels of plants pressed and dried, and afterward closely packed, can
be inexpensively forwarded by post, and, by the excellence of the Australian
postal arrangements, can be sent from distant stations of the interior, from
whence botanical specimens of any kind, for ascertaining the nature and
range of the species, are most acceptable ; while fyll information on such
material will at once he rendered, .
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 141

ant may learn to discriminate at once with exactness
between the different timber-trees, the grasses, the
plants worthy of ornamental culture, or any others
possessing industrial or cultural interest. The saw-
yer, as well as the trader in timber, may learn how
many of the one hundred and forty Australian Eu-
calypts occur within his reach—how phytography
designates each of them by a specific appellation ac-
knowledged all over the globe. Phytologic inquiry,
aided by collateral sciences, will disclose to him before-
hand the rules for obtaining the wood at the best sea-
sons, for selecting it for special purposes, for securing
the best preservation. Phyto-chemistry will explain
to him what average percentage of potash, oils, tar,
vinegar, alcohol, tannic acid, etc., may be obtained
under ordinary circumstances from each. He will
understand, for instance, that the so-called Red Gum-
tree of Victoria, the one so famed for the durability
of its wood and for the peculiar medicinal astringency
of its gum-resin, is widely different from the tree of
that vernacular named in Western Australia; that it
is wanting in Tasmania, yet that it has an extensive
geographic range over the interior of. our continent ;
and that thus the experiences gained on the products
of this particular species of tree by himself or others
are widely applicable elsewhere. Through collections
of these kinds the thoughtful colonist may have his
attention directed to vegetable objects of great value
in his own locality, of the existence of which he
might otherwise not readily become aware. New
trades may spring up, new exports may be initiated,
new local factories be established. Phytographic
works on Australian plants, now extan{ in many vol-

‘
142 FOREST CULTURE AND

umes, can readily be attached and rendered explana-
tory of such collections. A prize held out by the
patrons of any school might stimulate the juvenile
gatherer of plants to increased exertions ; his youth-
ful mind will be trained to observation and reflection
and the faculties of a loftier understanding will be
raised. ,

To the adult also, and particularly often to the
invalid, new sources of enjoyment may thus be dis-
closed. What formerly was passed by unregarded
will have a meaning ; every blade over which he
stepped thoughtlessly before will have a new-inter-
est; and even what he might have admired will gain
additional charm ; but while penetrating wonders he
never dreampt of before he ought piously to ask who
called them forth ?

‘Bright flowers shall bloom wherever we roam,
A voice Divine shall talk in each stream ;
The stars shall look like worlds of love,
And this earth shall be one beautiful dream.’’
Thos. Moore's Irish Melodies.

What one single plant may do for the human race
is perhaps best exemplified by the Cotton-plant. The
Southern States of North America sent to England in
1860 nearly half a million tons of cotton (458,522 tons),
by which means, in Britain alone, employment was
given to about a million of people engaged in indus-
tries of this fabric, producing cotton goods to the
value of £121,864,458. From rice, which like cotton
will mature its crop in some of the warmer parts of
Victoria,* sustenance is obtained for a greater num-
ber of human beings than from any other plant. In

 

* Particularly if the hardy mountain rice of China and Japan is chosen,
which required no irrigation, The ordinary rjce has been grown ag fay
north as Lombardy,
: EUCALYPTUS TREES. 148

the greater part of the Australian continent, where-
ever water supply could be commanded, the rice
would luxuriate. I found it wild in Arnheim’s Land
in 1855. Of sugar-cane the hardier varieties may
within Victoria succeed in East Gipps Land and
other warmer spots. Great Britain imported in 1863
not less than five hundred and eighty-six thousand
six hundred tons.* Even our young colony import-
ed last year to the value of nearly a million sterling
(£948,329). Think of the commerce in other vegeta-
ble products, such as require in different places our
local fostering care in order to add still more to our
resources. Of various tobaccos we imported into
Victoria in 1869 (deducting exports) to the value of
£83,788 ; of wine, £84,687; of cereals, £781,250; of
paper, £123,158. I will not enter on any remarks
about sugar-beet, on which one of our fellow-colonists
has lately compiled an excellent, treatise. Of tea, in
1865, Britain required for home consumption eighty-
five millions of lbs.+ What a prospect for tea growth
in Victoria, where this bush cares neither for the
scorching heat of the Summer nor for the night-frosts
of our lower regions ; whereas, in the forest glens of
our country, Tasmania, and elsewhere, the Tea-bush
would yield most prolific harvests. Test plantations
for manifold new cultures were recommended by me
years ago in one of my official reports to the Legisla-

 

* The total import of sugar into Britain was, during 1868, six hundred and
twenty-six thousand three hundred and one tons ; during 1869, six hundred
and five thousend one hundred and twenty-nine tons.”

+ The total EE of tea into Britain was—
During 1865,.
te 1866...
“1867...
#6 1868.....006 ie Maiaie lM eixiscala Hasisierisioeee atertera oe 154,845,863 ‘*
8 [BCD peepererpeeeenerreteerteserercernse regent acces 1bOD 200,208

+. 121,156,712 Ibs,
139,610 044 “«
128,028,726 ‘*

 
 
 
 
 
 
144 FOREST CULTURE AND

ture ; one plantation for the desert, one for subalpine
regions, one for the deep valleys of the woodlands.
The two latter might be in close vicinity at the Black
Spur, and thus within the reach of ready traffic. The
outlay in each case would be modest indeed. What
an endless number of new industrial plants might
thus be brought together within a few hours’ drive
of the city, under all the advantages of rich soil,
shelter, and irrigation! "What an attractive collection
for the intelligent and studious might thus be per-
manently formed.

I will not weary this audience by giving a long
array of names of any plants resisting alpine Winters,
such as in our snow-clad higher mountains they would
have to endure, We know that the Apple will live
where even the hardy Pear will succumb ; both will
stil] thrive on our alpine plateaus. The Larch, strug-
gling in vain with the dry heat of our open lowlands,
would be a tree of comparatively rapid growth near
alpine heights. The Birch, in Greenland, the only
tree in Italy ascending to six thousand feet, in Rus-
sia the most universal, and there yielding for famed
tanning processes its valued bark, is living—to quote
the forcible remarks of an elegant writer—<« is living
on the bleak mountain sides from which the sturdy
Oak shrinks with dismay.’’ Add to it, if you like,
the Paper- Birch, and a host of arctic, andine, and
other alpine trees and bushes. Disseminate the Straw-
berries of the countries of our childhood, naturalize
the Blackberry of northern forest moors. The Ameri-
can Cranberry-bush (Vaccinium macrocarpum), with
its large fruits, is said to have yielded on boggy mead-
ows, such as occupy a large terrain of the Australian
BUCALYPLUS TREES. 145

Alps, fully one hundred bushels on one acre in a year,
worth so many dollars. If once established, such a
plant would gradually spread on its own account for
the benefit of future highland inhabitants. The Su-
gar Maple would seek these cold heights, to be tapped
when the Winter snow melts. For half a century it
will yield its saccharine sap, equal to several pounds
of sugar annually.

Let us translocate ourselves now for a moment to
our desert tracts, changed as they will likely be many
years hence, when the waters of the Murray River,
in their unceasing flow from snowy sources, will be
thrown over the back plains, and no longer run en-
tirely into the ocean, unutilized for husbandry. The
lagoons may then be lined, and the fertile depres-
sions be studded with the Date Palm ; Fig-trees, like
in Egypt planted by the hundreds of thousands to in-
crease and retain the rain, will then also have ame-
liorated here the clime; or the White Mulberry-tree
will be extensively extant then instead of the Mallee
scrub ; not to speak of the Vine, in endless variety,
nor to allude to a copious culture of Cotton in those
regions. To Fig-trees and Mulberry-trees I refer
more particularly, because it must be always in the
first instance the object to raise in masses those utili-
tarian plants which can be multiplied with the ut-
most ease, and without any special skill, locally, and
which, moreover, as in this case, would resist the dry
heat of our desert clime. When recommending such
a culture for industrial pursuits, it is not the aim to
plant by the thousand, but by the million. Remem-
ber, also, that a variety of the Morus Alba occurs in
Affghanistan, With a delicious fruit ; and that the im-
146 FOREST CULTURE AND

portation of Figs into Britain alone, from countries in
climate alike to large tracts of Victoria, has been of
late years about one thousand tons annually. What
the Fig-tree has effected for rainless tracts of Egypt
is now on historic record.

I have spoken of horticultural industries as not al-
together foreign to this institution—indeed, as repre-
senting a rising branch of commerce, Were I to en-
ter on details of this subject the pages of this address
might swell to a volume. But this I would mention,
that.in our young country the manifold facilities for
rearing exotic plants in specially selected and adapted
localities could only as yet receive imperfect consid-
eration. "We have, however, ample opportunities of
selecting genial spots for the growth of such singular
curiosities as the Flytrap plant (Dionea Muscipula),
and the Pitcher-plants (Sarracenias) of the bogs and
swamps of the pine barrens and savannahs of Caroli-
na, if we proceed to moory portions of our springy
forest land. There is no telling, too, whether the
Pitcher-plants of Khasya and China (species of Ne-
penthes) could not readily be grownand multiplied in
similar localities, and the hardier of grand Epiphytes
among the orchids, such as the subalpine Oncidium
Warczewickyi, of Central America, which might
readily be reared in our glens by horticultural enter-
prise, together with all the hardier Palms which mod-
ern taste has so well adopted for the ready decoration
of dwelling-rooms.

Such plants as the Beaucarnea recurvata of Mexico,
with its five thousand flowers in a single panicle, and
the hardier Vellozias, from the bare mountain regions
of Brazil, would endure our open air; while the in-
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 147
numerable South African Heaths, Stapelie, the Me-
sembryanthema, Pelargonia, lily-like plants, and many
others, once the pride of European conservatories,
can, with increased sea traffic, now gradually be in-
troduced as beautifnl objects of trade into this coun-
try, where they need no glass protection. It leads
too far to speak of the still more readily accessible
numerous showy plants of South-west Australia, but
among which, as a mere instance, the gorgeous Ani-
gozanthi, the lovely Stylidia, the gay Banksiz, and
the fragrant Boronias may be mentioned.

Before leaving this topic, I may remind you that
many esculent plants of foreign countries are deserv-
ing yet of test culture, and, perhaps, general adop-
tion in this country. The Dolichos sesquipedalis, of
South American, is a bean, cultivated in France on
account of its tender pod. The Arracha esculenta, an
umbellate from the cooler mountains of Central Ameri-
ca, yields there, for universal use, its edible root.
The climbing Chocho, of West India (Sechium edule),
proved hardy in ‘Madeira, and furnishes a root and
fruit both palatable and wholesome. Vigna subter-
ranea is the Earth Nut of Natal. The Taro of Tahiti
(Calocasi macrorrhiza), though perfectly enduring our
lowland clime, is, as yet, with allied species, but lit-
tle cultivated — neither the Soja of Japan (Glycine
Soja), nor the Caper of the Mediterranean. The Sea-
kales (Crambe Maritima and C. Tatarica) might be
naturalized on our sandy shores.

Regarding fibres, much yet requires to be effected
by capitalists and cultivators, to turn such plants as
the Grasscloth shrub, which I distributed for upward
of a dozen years, to commercial importance for facto-
148 FOREST CULTURE AND

ries. A kind of Jute (Corchorus olitorius) succeeds
as far north as the Mediterranean, and grows wild
with the Sun Hemp (Crotalaria juncea ) in tropical
Australia; the latter plant comes naturally almost
to the boundaries of our colony. A Melbourne rope-
factory offers £36 for the ton of New Zealand Flax,
and can consume six tons per week. Hemp, used
since antiquity, produces, along with its fibre, the
Hypnotic Churras. England imported, in 1858,
Hemp, to the value of more than £1,000,000.* This
may suffice to indicate new resources in this direction.
For Sumach our country offers, in many places, the
precise conditions for its successful growth, as con-
firmed by actual tests. Tannic substances, of which
the indigenous supply is abundant and manifold,
would assume still greater commercial importance by
simple processes of reducing them to a concentrated
form. How on any forest river might not the Fil-
bert-tree be naturalized ; on precipitous places, among
rocks, it would form a useful jungle, furnishing, be-
sides, its nuts, the material for fishing-rods, hoops,
charcoal crayons, and other purposes. From a single
forest at Barcelona sixty thousand bushels are obtain-
ed ina year. (For these and many other data brought
before you in this lecture you may refer further, most
conveniently, to a posthumous work of the great Pro-
fessor Lindley, Treasury of Botany, edited by Mr.
Th. Moore, with the aid of able contributors.) Even
the Loquat would attain in our forest glens the size
of a fair, or even large tree.

 

* The import of Hemp and Jute into Britain during 1868 was three mil-
lion two hundred and eighty-one thousand two hundred and sixty-eight
hundred weight; during 1869, three million five hundred and fifty-one
thousand eight hundred and thirty-eight hundred weight, The undressed
Hemp imported in 1868 was valued at £2,022,419.
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 149°

Osiers and other willows used for basket-work, for
charcoal, or for the preparation of salicine, might line
any river banks, quite as much for the sake of shade
and consolidation of the soil as for their direct utili-
tarian properties. In the forest ranges any dense line
of Willows and Poplars will help to check the spread
of the dreadful conflagrations in which so much of the
best timber is lost, and through which the tempera-
ture of the country is for days heightened to an intol-
erable degree far beyond the scenes of devastation,
while injuries are inflicted far and wide to the labors
in the garden or the field. In the most arid deserts
the medicinal Aloes might readily be established,
to yield by a simple process the drug of commerce.
Gourds of half a hundred weight have been obtained
in Victoria, and show what the plants of the Melon
tribe might do here, like in South Africa, for eligible
spots in the desert land. Among the trees for those
arid tracts, the glorious Grevillea robusta, with its in-
numerable trusses of fiery red, and its splendid wood
for staves, is only one of the very many desirable ;
just as in the oases the Carob-tree will live without
water, uninjured, because its deeply-penetrating roots
render it fit to resist any drought. Butit may be said
that much that I instance is well known and well
recorded—so, doubtless, it is, in the abstract—but va-
riety requires to be distinguished from variety, spe-
cies from species, and their geography, internal struc-
ture and components need carefully to be set forth,
‘before any industry relating to plants can be raised
on sound ground in proper localities, and be brought
to its best fruitfulness.

Even a pond, a streamlet— how, with intelligent

8
150 FOREST CULTURE AND

foresight, may it be utilized and rendered lucrative
to industry! The Water Nuts,* naturally distributed
through large tracts of Europe and Asia, afford at
Cashmere alone, for five months in the year, a nutri-
tious and palatable article of food for thirty thousand
people. Can the Menyanthes not be made a native
here—one of the loveliest of water-plants, one of the
best of tonics? The true Bamboo, which I first prov-
ed hardy here, used for no end of purposes by the
ingenious Chinese—can we not plant it here at each
dwelling, at each stream, a grateful yielder to indus-
trial wants, not requiring itself any care—an object
destined to embellish whole landscapes? An Arun-
dinaria Bamboo from Nepal (A. falcata) proved very
tall and quite hardy, even in Britain; and yet taller
is the Mississippi Arundinaria (A. macrosperma) —
indeed, rivaling in height the gigantic Chinese or
Indian Bamboo.

Imagine how there might arise on the bold rocky
declivities of the Grampians the colossal columns
of the Cereus giganteus of the extra-tropic Colorado
regions —huge candelabras of vegetable structure,
which would pierce the roof of our museum hall if
planted on the floor, and would be as expansive in
width as the pedestal of the monument consecrated
to our unfortunate explorers. Picture to yourselves
an Echinocactus Visnago of New Mexico, lodged in
the wide ghasm of our Pyrenees, one of. these mon-
sters weighing a ton, and expanding into a length of
nine feet, with a diameter of three feet. Think of
such plants mingled with the Canarian Dragon-tree,
one of which is supposed to have lived from our

 

* Several species of Trapa,
EUCALYPTUS TREES, 151

Redeemer’s time to this age, because four centuries
effected on these Giant Lilies but little change.
Welwitchia here, like in rainless Damaraland, might
grow in our desert sands as one of the most wonder-
ful of plants, its only pair of leaves being cotyledo-
nous and lasting well-nigh through a century. Or
associate in your ideas with these one of the medici-
nal Tree Aloes of Namaqua, or one of the Poison Eu-
phorbias, never requiring pluvial showers (Euphorbia
grandidens), some as high as a good-sized two-storied
dwelling-house ; transfer to them also Cereus senilis,
thirty feet high, which, with all its attempts to look
venerable, only suceeds to be grotesque ; add to these
extraordinary forms such Lily-trees as the Fourcroya
longeeva, with a stem of forty feet and an inflorescence
of thirty feet, whereas Agave Americana, Agave
Mexicana and allied species, while they quietly pass
through the comparatively short space of time allotted
to their existence, weave in the beautiful internal
economy of their huge leaves the threads which are
to yield the tenacious Pita-cords, so much in quest for
the rope-bridges of Central America.

Some of the Echinocacti extend as far south as
Buenos Ayres and Mendoza, and would introduce
into many arid tracts of Victoria, together with the
almost numberless succulents of South Africa, a great
ornamental attraction, which horticultural enterprise
might turn to lucrative account; just like our native
showy plants will become objects of far higher eom-
mercial importance than hitherto has been attach-
ed to them. The columns of Cereus Peruvianus rise
sometimes to half a hundred feet; some Cactez are
in reality the vegetable fountains of the desert. Such

t
152 FOREST CULTURE AND

plants as Echinocactus platyceras, with its fifty thou-
sand thorns and sete, should be cultivated in our open
grounds for horticultural trade, whereas the Cochineal
Cacti (Opuntia Tuna, O. coccinellifera and a few other
species), might well be still further distributed here,
in order that food may be available for the cochineal
insects when other circumstances in Australia will
become favorable for the local production of this cost-
ly dye.

These are a few of many instances which might be
adduced to demonstrate how the landscape pictures
of Victoria might be embellished in another century,
-and new means of gain be obtained from additional
manifold resources.

But while your thoughts are carried to other zones
and distant lands, let us not lose sight of the reason
for which we assembled, namely, to deal with utilita-
rian objects and the application of science thereon.
All organic structures, however, whether giants or
pigmies, whether showy or inconspicuous, have their
allotted functions to fulfill in nature, are destined to
contribute to our wants, are endowed with their spe-
cial properties, are heralding the greatness of the Cre-
ator. But here in this hall I would like to see dis-
played by pictorial art the most majestic forms in
nature, were it only to delineate for the studious the
physiognomy of foreign lands, irrespective of any
known industrial value of the objects thus sketched.
The painter’s art in choosing from nature does impress
us most lastingly with the value and grandeur of its
treasures. Each plant, as it were, has a history of
discovery of its own ; who would not like to trace it ?
_ And this again brings us face to face with those who
EUCALYPTUS TREES, 153

carried before us the torch of scientific inquiry into
the dark recesses of mystery, and shed a flood of light
on perhaps long-concealed magnificence and beauty.
The youth, aroused to the sublime feeling of wishing
at least to follow great men in independent research-
es, may be animated if in a hall like this each divis-
ion were ornamented with the portraits of the fore-
most of those discoverers who through ages advanced
knowedge to the standard of the present day.

“* Deeda of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
. And departing leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time,

*« Though oft depressed and lonely,
Our fears are laid aside,
If we remember only
Such also lived and died.

‘*Learn from the grand old masters,
Or from the bard sublime,
Whose distant footsteps echo
Through the corridor of time.’’
LonerELiow,

Discovery proceeds step by step. Commenced by
original thinkers, enlarged by sedulous experimenters,
fostered by the thoughtful. portion of the community,
and by any administration of high views, it is util-
ized by well-directed enterprise, and marches onward
steadily in its progress. Guftenberg and his collabo-
rators gave us the printing art, which has done more
to enlighten the world than all other mechanisms
taken together yj and though four centuries have alter-
ed much in the speed and cost of producing prints,
they have not materially changed the forms of this
glorious art, as the beautifully-decorated pages of the
earliest printed Bibles testify. Thus we have reason
to be yet daily grateful for this invaluable gain from
the genius of days long passed.
154 FOREST CULTURE AND

Thoughtless criticism is but too often impatient of
success, and demands results premature and unreason-
able. Incompetent and perversive censure may even
carry the sway of public opinion—misleading, and
misled; and, still worse, organized tactics may apply
themselves, for sinister purposes of their own, to dis-
turb the quiet work of the discoverer, mar the results
of his labors, or paralyze the vitality of research, not
understanding, or not wishing to understand, its di-.
rection or its object.

And yet, should we have no faith in science, wheth-
er it reveals to us the minutest organisms in ‘a perfec-"
tion unalterable, * or the grandest doctrines of truth,
sure ever to bear on human happiness and the peace
of our soul; should we have no faith in science,
whether it unravels the metallic treasures of the depth
and the coals of the forests of bygone ages, or by eter-
nal laws permits us to trace the orbits of endless ce-
lestial worlds through space ; no faith, if it allows us
through spectroscopic marvels to count unerringly the
billions of oscillations of each ray of dispersed light
within a second; or if it discloses the chemism of
distant worlds, and therewith an applicability of re-
search, both tellural and sidereal, ever endless and
inexhaustible. Science, as the exponent of God-like

 

* As an instance of the marvelous complexity, and yet exquisite perfection
of the minutest creatures, the organ of vision in insects may be adduced.
Most careful observers have ascertained that the eyes of very many insects
are compound, contain numerous eyelets; each of these provided with a
distinct cornea, lens, iris, pupil, and a whole nervous apparatus, In our
despised ordinary house-fly may be counted about four thousand of these
most subtle instruments of vision; in some dragon-flies about twelve thou-
sand. Reliable microscopists have counted even seventeen thousand three
hundred and fifty-five in a kind of butterfly, while in the beetle genus mor-
della these most delicate eyelets have been found to rise to the almost incred-
ns ‘ae of twenty - fiye thousand and eighty -eight.—(From Th. Rym,

ones. .
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 155

laws, draws us in deepest veneration to the power
divine, That is true science !

“ As into tints of sevenfold ray
Breaks soft the silvery shimmering white;
As fade the sevenfold tints away,
And all the rainbow melts in light;
So from the Iris gportive call
Each magic tint the eye to chain,
And now let truth unite them all,
And light its single stream regain.’’,
—Bulwer Lytton, from Schiller.

If a series of experiments with coloring principles
from coal-tar and bituminous substances led to the
invention of the brilliant aniline colors, and brought
about an almost total change in many dye processes,
how many new wonders may not be disclosed to tech-
nology by the rapid strides of organic chemistry ?
As is well-known, three or four chemic elements are
only engaged-in forming numberless organic com-
pounds, by a slight increase or decrease or rearrange-
ment of the atomic molecules, constructing, for in-
stance, from these three or four elements, ever pres-
ent and ever attainable, the deadly hydrocyanic acid,
the terrible atropin, or the dreadful aconitin at one
time ; or at another time, harmless ammonia com-
binations universally used for culinary and other pur-
poses of daily life. Our wood-tars, we may remem-
ber, are left, as yet, almost unexamined as regards
their chemic constitutents. Few of our timbers have
been chemically analyzed ; few other of our vegetable
products are as yet accurately tested. What an end-
less expanse for exploration does organic chemistry
thus offer us! Weare called on, among a thousand
things, to trace out similar mutual relation and coun-
teraction of such extremely powerful plants as the
156 FOREST CULTURE AND -

Belladonna and Calabar Bean. Here medicine, chem-
istry, and phytology go hand i in hand. How, again,
is any analysis of the cltemic constituents of any
plant, for cultural purposes or otherwise, to be ap-
plied,unless we command a language of phytographic
expressions which will name with never-failing pre-
cision the object before us, and give to its elucidation
value and stability 2?

We may speak chemically ot potash plants, lime
plants, and so forth; we may wish to define thereby
the direction of certain industrial pursuits, and we
may safely thereby foretell what plants can be raised
profitably on any particular soil or with the use of
any particular manure; but how is this knowledge to
be fixed without exact phytologic information, or how
is the knowledge to be applied, if we are to trust to
vernacular names, perplexing even within the area
of a small colony, and useless, as a rule, beyond it ?
Colonial Box-trees by dozens, yet all distinct, and
utterly unlike Turkey Box ; colonial Myrtle, without
the remotest resemblance to the poet’s myrtle; colo-
nial Oaks, analogous to those Indian trees which as
Casuarine were distinguished so graphically by Rumpf
two hundred years ago, but without a trace of simi-
larity to any real Oak—afford instances of our confused
and ludicrous vernacular appellations. A total change
is demanded, resting on the rational observations and
deductions which science already has gained for us.
Assuredly, with any claims to ordinary intelligence,
we ought to banish such designations, not only from
museum collections, but also from the dictionary of
the artisan. .

One of the genera of Mushrooms, certainly the
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 157

largest of them (Agaricus), contains alone about a
thousand species, well distinguished from each other,
a good many even occurring in this country. For the
practical purposes of common life it becomes an object
to distinguish the many wholesome from the multi-
tude of deleterious kinds, or the circumstances under
which the harmless sorts may become hurtful. In
France the cultivation of mushrooms in under-ground
caverns has become a branch of industry not altogeth-
er unimportaut. How, in other instances, is many a
culinary vegetable to be distinguished from the poi-
son herb without the microscope of the phytographer
being applied to dissections, or without the language
of science recording the characters? How many.a
life, lost through a child’s playfulness, or through the
unacquaintance of the adult, even with the most ordi-
nary objects of knowledge among plants, might have
been saved, even in these times of higher education,
if phytologic knowledge was more universal! The
species of fungi which can be converted into pleasant,
nutritious food are far more numerous than popularly
supposed, but for extending industries in this direc-
tion botanic science must assume the guardianship.
In a technologic hall like this I should like to see
instructive portraits also of all the edible and noxious
plants likely to come within the colonist’s reach.
Among about one thousand kinds of Fig-trees which
(so Mons. Alphonse de Candolle tells me), through
Mons. Bureau’s present writings for the Prodromus,
are ascertained to exist, only one yields the fig of our
table, only one forms the famed sycamore fig, planted
along so many roads of the Orient; only one consti-
tutes our own Ficus macrophylla, destined, in its

=)
158 FOREST CULTURE AND

unsurpassed magnificence, to overshade here our path-
ways. How are these thousands of species of Ficus,
all distinct in appearance, in character, and in uses—
how are they to be recognized, unless a diagnosis of
each becomes carefully elaborated and recorded , head-
ed by a specific name ?

Without descriptive botany all safe discrimination
becomes futile. To bear our share in building up an
universal system of specific delimitation of all plants
is a task well worthy of the patronage of an intelligent
and high-minded people. The physician is thereby
guided to draw safe comparisons in reference to the
action of herbs and roots which he wishes to prescribe,
as available from native resources. Thus it was
through Victorian researches that not only the close
affinity of Goodeniacesx to the order of Gentianez was
brought to light, but simultaneously a host of herbs
and shrubs of the former order gained for therapeutic
uses. When oncé it was ascertained that the so-
called Myrtle-tree of our forest moors was a true Beech
the artisan then also found offered to him a timber of
great similarity to that of the Beech forests of his
British home.

Of the grass genus Panicum we know the world
possesses, according to a recent botanic disquisition,
about eight hundred and fifty species, all more or less
nutritive. But one only of these is the famous Coa-
pin of Angola (Panicum spectabile), one of the War-
ree (Panicum miliaceum), one the Bhadlee (Panicum
pilosum), one the Derran (P, frumentaceum). We
might dispense, perhaps, as far as these few are con-
cerned} with their scientific appellations, though not
even the mere task of naming has become therewith
EUCALYPTUS TREES, 159

easier, and no information whatsoever of their char-
acteristics has been gained. But if we wish to refer
to any of the many hundred other species of Panicum,
in what way are we to express ourselves if even their
vernacular names could be collected from at least a
dozen of languages, and impressed on any one’s mem-
ory? They are, as may readily be imagined, very
different indeed in their special nutritiveness, degree
of endurance, and length of life. Ofone hundred and
forty species of Bromus only one is the Prairie Grass,
which has attained already a great celebrity as a pas.
ture grass naturalized in this country ; and it is only
one other Bromus, among the many nutritious kinds,
which carries the palm as the most fattening fod-
der-grass for cold, marshy pastures, and gradually,
through depasturing, suppresses completely all other
grasses and weeds; so it is proved on the marsh-
lands of Oldenburg. This Bromus (B. secalinus), as
far as I am cognizant, is nowhere as yet economically
cultivated in Victoria.

Nothing would be easier than to commence dissem-
inating a number of the best grasses in addition to
those already here; for instance, the Canadian Rice-
Grass (Hydropyrum esculentum) for our swamp-lands.
Their nutritive value must be tested by analysis and
other experiments, just like that of the Saltbushes of
the Murray Flats, Hence ample scope for the exer-
tions of science also in this direction,

In Cotta’s celebrated publishing establishment at
Stuttgart a most useful work is issued by my friend,
Prof. Noerdlinger, on the structure of timber of vari-
ous kinds, illustrated by microscopic sections of the
wood itself; for the latter fascicles I furnished some
160 FOREST CULTURE AND

material,from this colony. The work should be ac-
cessible in this Museum to all interested in wood-
work,

How much we have yet to learn of the value of our
forest products is instanced when we now know from
Spanish physicians to combat ague with Eucalyptus-
leaves, or when Count Maillard de Marafy, from ex-
periments instituted this year in Egypt, announced
to us that Eucalyptus-leaves can be used as a substi-
tute for Sumach. (Egypte Agricole, 1870.)

Already, in the earlier part of this lecture, I spoke
of the Peru Bark plants; but the Cinchonas are not
all of the same kind. Some endure a lower degree
of temperature than others, some are richer in qui-
nine, others richer in cinchonine, others in quinoi-
dine; and this again is much subject to fluctuations
under different éffects of climate and soil. Great er-
rors may be committed, and have been committed,
by adopting from among a number of species the least
valuable, or one under ordinary circumstances almost
devoid of alkaloid, though a representative of the
genus cinchona, and not unlike the lucrative species.
When calculations in India prognosticate the almost
incredible annual return of one hundred and thirty-
per cent., after four years, on the original outlay for
Cinchona plantation, it is supposed that the conditions
for this new industrial culture are to the utmost favor-
able. That one of the best species did not thrive
there at all in proportion to expectations is owing, in
my opinion, to geologic conditions. The Cinchonas
before you, reared in soil from our Fern-tree gullies,
I intended to have tested for the percentage of their
alkaloids prior to this evening ; but the timely per-
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 161

formance of this investigation was frustrated. I
think that I have proved the hardiness or adaptabil-
ity of these important plants for the warm Palm val-
leys of East Gipps Land, as many indigenous plants
from that genial spot are quite as much, if not more,
susceptible to the night- frosts of our city than the
Cinchone, if harsh, cutting winds are kept from the
latter. Butas yet Iam unacquainted with the likely
results of remunerative Cinchona cultivation within
the boundaries of this colony, as far as such depends
on the constituents of the soil, That inquiries of this
kind are not mere chimeras may be conceded after
an explanation of this kind for the benefit of future
technology. Geology, one of the brightest satellites
which rotate around the sun of universal science, con-
tinues to send its lustre into the darkness which yet
involves so many of the great operations in tellurian
nature. Further insight into the relation of this dis-
cipline of science to vegetable physiology is certain
to shed abundance of light alsoon many branches of
applied industry. The causes why the Iron- bark
trees of our auriferous quartz ridges differ so material-
ly from the conspecific tree of alluvial flats can only
be explained geologically. So it is with the narrow-
leaved Eucalyptus amygdalina on open stony decliv-
ities as compared with the broad-leaved Eucalyptus
fissilis, which in such gigantic dimensions towers up
from our deep forest valleys. But all this has an im-
portant bearing on technological exertions in manifold
directions. The timber chosen by the artisan from a
wrong locality may impair the soundness of a whole
building; or a factory may prove not lucrative simply
because it is placed on a wrong spot for the best raw
material.
162 FOREST CULTURE AND

A thousand of other industrial purposes might yet
be served by a close knowladge of plants. So the
designer might choose patterns far more beautiful
from the simple and ever-perfect beauty of nature than
he gains from distorted forms copied into much of our
tapestry ; thus a room, now-a-days, as a rule, decorat-
ed with unmeaning and often, as far as imitation of
nature is concerned, impossible figures, might become,
geographically or phytographically, quite instructive.
If here the founders of territorial estates—some, per-
haps, as large as the palatinates of the Middle Ages—
should wish to perpetuate the custom of choosing a
symbol for family arms, they—as the Highland clans,
who adopted special plants of their native mountains
for a distinguishing badge—might select, as the an-
cestral emblem, the flowers of our soil, destined, per-
haps, to be traced, not without pride, by many a
lineage through a hundred generations."

Precise knowledge of even the oceanic vegetation,
in its almost infinite display of forms, offers not mere-
ly the most delicate objects for design, but brings be-
fore us its respective value for manure, or the impor-
tance of various herbage on which fishes will browse ;
while such marine weeds may as well be transferred
from ocean to ocean, as ova of trout have been brought
from the far north to these distant southern latitudes.
Who could foresee when first iodine was accidentally
discovered in sea ~- weeds, through soda factories, or
bromine subsequently appeared as a mere substance
of curiosity, what powerful therapeutic agents there-
by were gained for medicine, what unique results they
would render for chemical processes, of what incalcu-
lable advantages they would proye in physiological
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 163

researches or microscopic tests; and how, without
them, photographic art could not have depictured,
with unerring fidelity, millions of objects, whether of
landscapes or of the starry sky, whether of the beings
dear to us or the relics of antiquity, whether enlarging
the scope of lithography or recording the languages,
which the flashing of telegraphic electricity sends to
adwelling or to an empire? Even the vegetable
fossils, deep-buried in the earth or in the cleavage of
rocks, when viewed by the light of phytology, become
so many letters on the pages of nature’s revelation,
from which we are to learn the age of strata, or may
trace the sources of metallic wealth, or by which we
may be guided to huge rémnants of forests of bygone
ages, stored up for the utilization of this epoch, or
may comprehend, as far as mortal understanding
serves us, successive changes in tellurian creation.
When Ray and, subsequently, Jussieu, framed the
first groundwork for the ordinal demarcation of
plants; when Tournefort, by defining generic limits,
brought further clearness into the chaos of dawning
systematic knowledge,’and when Linne gave so hap-
pily to each plant its second or specific name, but lit-
tle was it indeed foreseen what a vast influence these
principles of sound methodic arrangement would ex-
ercise, not only on the easy recognition of the varied
forms of vegetable life, but also on the philosophic
elucidation of their properties and uses, and this for
all times to come. Many, even at the present day,
and among them at times those on whom the desti-
nies of whole states and populations may depend, can
recognize in phytographic and other scientific labors
put little else than a mere play-work ; yet, without
164 FOREST CULTURE AND

such labors, every solid basis for applying the knowl-
edge of plants to uses of any kind would be wanting.
We would stray, indeed, unguided in a labyrinth
between crude masses or inordinate fragments, instead
of dwelling in a grand and lasting structure of knowl-
edge, unless science also in this direction had raised
its imperishable temples. But how much patient and
toilsome research had to be spent thus to bring togeth-
er in a systematic arrangement all the products of
this wide globe; how many dangers of exploring
travelers had-to be braved to amplify the material for
this knowledge, and how many have to pass away,
even now-a-days, persecuted and worried like Galileo
at his time, no‘one yet has éold, nor will tell. Well
may we feel with the great German poet, as expressed
in Bulwer Lytton’s beautiful wording :

‘<I will reward thee in a holier land,
Do give to me thy youth!
All I can grant you lies in this command—
I heard, and trusting in a holier land,
Gave my young joys to truth.”

But is there nothing higher than the search of
earthly riches, and is to this all knowledge of the
earth’s beautiful vegetation also to be rendered sub-
servient ? Is there nothing loftier than to break the
flowers for our gayeties or to strew them alonga
mirthful path ? There is! They raised the noblest
feelings of the poet at all ages ; they spoke the purest
words of attachment; they ever were the silent har-
bingers of love. They smilingly inspired hope anew
in unmeasured sadness, and on the death-bed or at
the grave they appear to link together, as symbols of
ever -returning springs, the mortal world with im-
mortality ; they ever teach us some of the sublimest
revelations of our eternal God.
EUCALYPTUS TREES, 165

The laurel crown of the hero was a people’s high-
est reward of chivalrous and glorious deeds.

The myrtle or orange-wreath for bridal curls re.
mains the proudest gift to youthful hope.

The little blooming weed, content in a parched and
dreary desert, revived the strength of many a sinking
wanderer (Mungo Park); the ever unalterable beauty
and harmony of moral structures preaches the truths
of eternal laws in the universe —a faith that gave
expression to Schiller’s memorable words, as repeated
by that leading British statesman, Gladstone: ‘It’s
not all chance the world obeys.’’ The innocent love-
liness of nature’s flowers has often aroused anew the
shaken spirit of the philosopher, and to these and
other gifts of nature the American bard alludes whén
he speaks of the great zoologist, Agassiz, of whose
friendship I may well be proud :

«* And whenever the way seemed so long,
Or his heart began him to fail, ©
She would sing a still more wondrous song,
Or tell a more marvellous tale.”

And when it seems that all hopes of the weeping
mother are extinguished, or even the teachings of
religion may well-nigh forsake her, then the deep
meaning of some of our noblest poems, inspired by
nature, is understood, and faith in eternity once more

embraced.

++ And the mother gave iu tear and pain
The flowers she most did love ;
She knew she would find them all again
In the fields of light above.”

« And with childlike credulous affection
We behold their tender bud expand—
Emblems of our own resurrection—
Emblems of the bright and better land,””
 

Eucalyptus Globulus.
(Showing the Seed Cups.)
AUSTRALIAN VEGETATION,

The great continent of Australia exhibits through-
out its varied zones marked diversities in the physi-
ognomy of its vegetation. These differences stand
less in relation to geographical latitudes than to geo-
logical formations, and especially climatical condi-
tions. Yet it is in few localities only where the pecu-
liar features, impressed by nature as a whole on the
Australian landscape, cannot at once be recognized.
The occurrence of Eucalypts and simple-leaved Aca-
cias in all regions, and the preponderance of these
trees in most, suffice alone to demonstrate that in
Australia we are surrounded largely by forms of the
vegetable world which, as a complex, nowhere re-oc-
cur beyond its territory, unless in creations of ages
passed by.

In a cursory glance at the vegetation, as intended
on this occasion, it js not the object to analyze its
details. In viewing vegetable life here, more parti-
cularly as the exponent of clime, or as the guide for
settlement, or as the source of products for arts and
manufactures, we may content ourselves by casting a
view only on the leading features presented by the
world of plants in this great country. While the
absence of very high and wooded mountains imparts
to the vegetation throughout a vast extent of Austra-
lia a degree of monotony, we percéiye that the occur-

\
168 FOREST CULTURE AND

rence of lofty forest ranges along the whole eastern
and south-eastern coast changes largely there the as-
pect of the country, and in this alteration the moun-
tainous island Tasmania greatly participates. Thus
the extensive umbrageous forest regions of perpetual
humidity commence in the vicinity of Cape Otway ;
extend occasionally, but not widely interrupted,
through the southern and eastern part of Victoria,
and thence, especially on the seaside slopes of the
ranges, throughout the whole of extra-and intra-trop-
ical Hast Australia in a band of more or less width,
until the cessation of elevated mountains on the north-
ern coast confines the regions of continued moisture
to a narrow strip of jungle-land margining the coast.
In this vast line of elevated coast-country, extend-
ing in length over nearly three thousand miles, and
which fairly may pass as the ‘‘ Australian jungle,”’ the
vegetation assimilates more than elsewhere to extra-
Australian types, especially to the impressive floral
features of continental and insular India. Progressing
from the Victorian promontories easterly, and thence
northerly, we find that the Eucalypts, which still pre-
ponderate in the forest of the southern ranges, gradu-
ally forsale us, and thus in eastern Gipps Land com-
mences the vast assemblage of varied trees which so
much charms by its variety of forms, and so keenly
engages attention by the multiplicity of its interest.
Bathed in vapor from innumerable springs or torrents,
and sheltered under the dark foliage of trees very
varied in form, a magnificent display of the Ferti-
trees commences, for which further westerly we
would seek in vain the climatic conditions. Even
isolated sentries, as it were, of the Fern-tree masses
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 169

are scattered not further west than to the craters of
extinct volcanoes near Mount Gambier, and although

colossal Todea Ferns, with stems six to ten feet high,

and occasionally as thick, emerge from the streamlets
which meander through the deep ravines near Mount
Lofty, on St. Vincent’s Gulf, we miss there the stately
Palm-like grace of the Cyathee, Dicksonis, and Al-
sophile, which leave on the lover of nature who ever
beheld them the remembrance of their inexpressible
beauty. These Fern- trees, often twenty to thirty,

occasionally fifty to seventy feet high, and at least as
many years old, if not older, admit readily of removal
from theirstill mild and humid haunts to places where,

for decorative vegetation, we are able to produce the

moisture and the shade necessary for their existence.

Of all Fern-trees of the globe that species which pre-
dominates through the dark glens of Victoria, Tasma-
nia, and parts of New South Wales, the Dicksonia
Antarctica (although not occurring in the antarctic
regions), is the most hardy and least susceptible to
dry heat. This species, therefore, should be chosen
for garden ornaments, or for being plunged into any
park glens; and if it is considered that trees half a
century old may with impunity be deprived of their
foliage and sent away to distant countries as ordinary
merchandise, it is also surprising that a plant so abund-
ant has not yet become an article of more extended:
commerce.

A ‘aultitude of smaller ferns, many of delicate
forms, are harbored under the shade of jungle vege-
tation, amounting in their aggregate to about one
hundred and sixty species, to which number future
researches in north-east Australia will undoubtedly
170 FOREST CULTURE AND

add, The circular Asplenium nidus, or great Nest
Fern, with fronds often six feet long, extends to the
eastern part of Gipps Lund, but the equally grand Stag-
horn Fern (Platycerium alcicorne and P. grande)
seemingly cease to advance south of Illawarra, while
in northérn Queeensland Angiopteris evecta count
among the most gorgeous, and two slender Alsophile
among the most graceful forms. The transhipment
of all these Ferns offerg lucrative inducements to trad-
ers with foreign countfies. Epiphytal Orchids, so
much in horticultural request, are less numerous in
these jungle-tracts than might have been anticipated,
those discovered not yet exceeding thirty in number.
Their isolated outposts advance in one representative
species—the Sarcochilus Gunnii—to Tasmania and the
vicinity of Cape Otway, and in another—Cymbidium
canaliculatum—toward Central Australia. The com-
parative scantiness of these epiphytes contrasts as
strangely with the Indian Orchid-vegetation as with
the exuberance of the lovely terrestrial co-ordinal
plants throughout most parts of extra-tropical Austra-
lia, from whence one hundred and twenty well-defined
species are known. Still more remarkable is the al-
most total absence of Orchids, both terrestrial and epi-
phytal, from north and north-west Australia, an ab-
sence for which in the central parts of the continent
aridity sufficiently accounts, but for which we have
no other explanation in the north than that the spe-
cies have as yet there effected but a limited migra-
tion. To the jungles and cedar-brushes—the latter
so named because they yield that furniture-wood so
famed as the Red Cedar (Cedrela taona, a tree identi-
cal as a species with the Indian plant, though slight-
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 171

ly different in its wood) are absolutely confined the
Anonacee, Laurines, Monimiew, Meliacee, Rubi-
acee, Myrsinee, Sapotes, Ebenacee, and Anacardiez,
together with the Baccate Myrtacez, and nearly all
the trees of Euphorbiacez, Rutacez, Apocynem, Celas-
trine, Sapindacexz, which, while often outnumbering
the interspersed Eucalypts, seem to transfer the ob-
server to Indian regions. None in the multitude of
trees of these orders, with exception of our tonic-aro-
matic Sassafras-tree (Atherospermum moschatum) and
Hedycarpa Cunninghami, which supplies to the na-
tives the friction-wood for igniting, transgress in the
south the meridians of Gipps Land. Palms cease also
there to exist, but their number increases northward
along the east coast, while in Victoria these noble
plants have their only representative in the tall-cab-
bage or Fan- palm of the Snowy River —that Palm
which, with the equally hardy Areca sapida of New
Zealand, ought to be established wherever the Date is
planted for embellishment. Rotang Palms (Calami
of several species) render some of the northern thick-
ets almost inapproachable, while there, also, on a few
spots of the coast, the Cocoanut-tree occurs spontane-
ously. A few peculiar Palms occur in the Cassowary
country, near Cape York, and others around the Gulf of
Carpentaria, as far west as Arnhemsland. The tallest
of all, the lofty Alexandra Palm (Ptychosperma Alex-
dre), extends southward to the tropic of Capricorn,
and elevates its majestic crown widely beyond the or-
dinary trees of the jungle. The products of these en-
tire forests is as varied as the vegetation which con-
stitutes them. As yet, however, their treasures have
been but scantily subjected to the test of the physi-
172 FOREST CULTURE AND

cian, the manufacturer, or the artisan. The bark of
Alstonia constricta, like that of allied Indian species,
is ascertained to be febrifugal, so that of Chionanthus
axillaris, and Brucea Sumatrana. Caoutchouc might
be produced from various trees, especially the tall
kinds of Ficus. The lustre and tint of the polished
woods of others is unrivaled. Edible fruits are yield-
ed by Achras Australis, Achras Pohlmaniana, Mimu-
sops kauki, Zizyphus jujuba, Citrus Australis, Citrus
Planchonii, Eugenia Myrtifolia, Eugenia tierneyana,
Parinarium nonda, the Candlenut-tree (Aleurites tri-
loba), and the cluster Fig-tree (Ficus vesca, which
produces its bunches from the stem) ; also by species
of Owenia and Spondias, and by several brambles
and vines. Starchy aliment or edible tubers are fur-
nished by Tacca pinnatifida, by several Cissi (C. opaca,
C. clematidea, acrid when unprepared), Marsdeni vir-
idiflora, Colocasia antiquorum, Alocasia macrorrhiza,
by a colossal Cycas, some Zamis, and several kinds of
-Yam (Dioscorea bulbifera, Dioscorea punctata, and
other species), Backhousia citriodora and Myrtus
fragrantissima yield a cosmetic oil; so, also, Euca-
lyptus citriodora, a tree not confined to the jungle,
and two kinds of Ocimum. Semecarpus anacardium,
the marking Nut-tree, is a native of the most north-
ern brush-country. The medicinal Mallotus Philip-
pinensis, and the poisonous Exceecaria Agallocha are
more frequent. Baloghia lucida furnishes a red dye
never to be obliterated.

Many of the trees of the coast-forests of East Aus-
tralia range from the extreme north to the remotest
south, among them the Palm -panax ; others, like
Araucaria Cunninghami, extend only to the northern
HUCALYPTUS TREES. 173

part of New South Wales, while some, including
Araucaria Bidwelli, or the Bunya-Bunya-tree, so re-
markable for its large, edible, nutlike seeds, and the
Australian Kauri, Dammara robusta, are confined to
very circumscribed or solitary areas. The absence of
superior spice-plants (as far as hitherto ascertained)
amidst a vegetation of prevailing Indian type is not
a little remarkable, for Cinnamomum Laubatii ranks
only as a noble timber-tree, and the native nutmegs
areinert. The scantiness of acanthaceous plants is
also a noticeable fact. Podostemones have not yet
been found. Many plants of great interest to the
phytographer are seemingly never quitting the north-
eastern peninsula; among these the Banksian ba-
nana (Musa Banksii), the pitcher-plant (Nepenthes
Kennedyana), the vermillion - flowered Eugenia Wil-
sonii, the curious Helmholtzia acorifolia, the Mar
shal-tree, Archidendron Vaillantii (the only plant of
the vast order of Leguminose with numerous styles),
the splendid Diplanthera quadrifolia, Ficus magnifo-
lia, with leaves two feet long, the tall Cardwellia sub-
limis, and the splendid Cryptocarpa Mackinnoniana,
are especially remarkable. Rhapidophara, Pothos,
Piper, together with a host of Lianes, especially gay
through the prevalence of Ipomeas, tend with so many
other plants to impart to the jungle part of Australia
all the luxuriance of tropical vegetation. Of the two
great Nettle-trees, the Laportea gigas occurs in the most
northern regions, while Laportea photinifolia is more
widely diffused. Helicia is represented by a number
of fine trees far south, some bearing edible nuts.
Doryanthes excelsa, the tall spear-lily, is confined to
the forests of New South Wales. The flowers of Ob-

9
174 FOREST CULTURE AND

eronia palmicola are more minute than those-of any
other orchideous plant, although more than two thou-
sand species are known from various parts of the globe.
The display of trees eligible for avenues from these
jungles is large. The tall Fern-palm (Zamia Deniso-
nii), one of the most stately members of the varied
Australian vegetation, is widely, but nowhere copi-
ously, diffused along the east coast ; it yields a kind
of sago, like allied plants. The beans of Castanosper-
mum Australe, which are rich in starch, and those of
Entada purseetha, from a pod often four feet long, are,
with very many other vegetable substances, on which
Mons. Thozet has shed much light, converted by the
aborigines into food.

If plants representing the genera Berberis, Impa-
tiens, Rosa,. Begonia, Ilex, Rhododendron, Vaccini-
um, or, perhaps, even Firs, Cypresses, and Oaks, do
at all occur in Australia, as in the middle regions of
the mountains of India, it will be on the highest hills
of north-east Australia—namely, on the Bellenden
Ker ranges, mountains still unapproachable through
the hostility of the natives—where they will find the
cooler and simultaneously moist, tropical climate con-
genial to their existence. But whatever may be the
variety and wealth of the primitive flora of East Aus-
tralia, it is only by the active intelligence and exer-
tions of man that the greatest riches can be wrought
from the soil. Whatever plants he may choose to
raise—whatever costly spices, luscious fruits, expen-
sive dyes; whether cacao, manihot, or other aliment-
ary plants; whether sugar, coffee, or any others of
more extensive tropical tillage—for all may be found
wide tracts fitted for their new home.
EUCALYPTUS TREES, 175

The close access to harbors facilitates culture, while
the expansive extent of geographical latitude on the
east coast admits of choosing such spots asin each in-
stance present the most favorable climatic conditions
for the success of each special plantation. Beyond the
coast ranges the country westward changes with aug-
menting dryness generally at once into more open
pastoral ground. Basaltic downs and gentle verdant
rises of eminent richness of herbage may alternately
give way to Brigalow scrubs, or sandstone plateaux,
or porphyritic or granitichills, and with the change of
the geological formation a change, often very appa-
rent, will take place alsoin the vegetation. Inland we
will lose sight of the glossy, dense, umbrageous foliage,
which now only borders a generally low coast in
the north, terminating there frequently in mangroves.
Strychnos nux vomica occurs among the coast-bushes
here, and also an Antiaris (A. macrophylla); but
whether the latter shares the deadly poison of the
Upas-tree of Java and Sumatra requires to be ascer-
tained. Tamarindus Indica isknown from Arnhems-
land, and the French bean (Phaseolus vulgaris) in a
spontaneous state from the north-west coast. Euca-
lypts, again, form away from the sea the prevailing
timber, but with the exception of the Red Gum-tree
(Eucalyptus rostrata), which lines most of the rivers
of the whole of the Australian interior, the southern
species are replaced by others, never of gigantic
growth, in some instances adorned with brilliant scar-
let or crimson blossoms. But neither these nor many
distinct kinds of northern Acacias and Melaleucas
stamp on the country the expression of peculiarity.
Familiar Australian forms usually surround us, though
Lie FOREST CULTURE AND

those of the cooler zone, and even the otherwise al-
most universal Senecios, are generally absent. Cype-
rus vaginatus, perhaps the best of all textile rushes,
ranges from the remotest south to these northern re-
gions. Hibiscus tiliaceus, with other malvaceous
plants, is here chosen by the natives for the fibre of
their fishing-nets and cordage. An occasional inter-
spersion of the dazzling Erythrina vespertilio, of
Bauhinia Leichardti, Erythrophleurn Laboucheri,
Livistonia Palms, and many Terminaliz, some with
edible fruits, Cochlospermum Gregorii, C. heterone-
mum, remind, however, of the flora of tropical lati-
tudes, which, moreover, to the eye of an experienced
observer, is revealed also in a multitude of smaller
plants, either identical with South Asiatic species or
representing in peculiar forms tropical genera. The
identity of about six hundred Asiatic plants (some
cosmopolitan) with native Australian species, has been
placed beyond doubt, and to this series of absolutely
identical forms, as well derived from the jungle as
from grounds free of forest, unquestionably several
hundred will yet be added.

Melaleuca leucadendron, the Cajeput-tree of India,
is among Indo-Australian trees one of the most uni-
versal ; it extends, as one of the largest timber-trees
of north Australia, along many of its rivers, and in
diminutive size over the dry sand-stone table-lands,
The Asiatic and Pacific Casuarina equisetifolia accom-
panies it often in the vicinity of the coast. By far
the most remarkable form in the vegetation of north-
west Australia is the Gouty -stem- tree (Adansonia
Gregorii) ; but it is restricted to a limited tract of
coast-country. It assumes precisely the bulky form
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 177

of its only congener, the Monkey-bread-tree, or Bao-
bab of tropical Africa (Adansonia digitata), dissimilar
mainly in having its nuts not suspended on long fruit-
stalks, Evidence, though not conclusive, gained in
Australia, when applied to the African Baobab, ren-
ders it improbable that the age of any individual tree
now in existence dates from remote antiquity. This
view is also held by Dr. G. Bennett, of Sydney. The
tree is of economic importance ; its stem yields a mu-
cilage indurating to a tragacanth-like gum. It is also
one of the few trees which introduces the unwonted
sight of deciduous foliage into the evergreen Austra-
lian vegetation. Numerousswamps and smaller lakes
exist within moderate distance of the coast; as in
many other parts of Australia, these waters are sur-
rounded by the wiry Polygonum (Muehlenbeckia
Cunninghami), and in Arnhemsland occasionally also
by rice-plants, not distinct from the ancient culture-
plant. But here, in almost equinoctial latitudes, the
stagnant fresh waters are almost invariably nourishing
two Water-lilies of great beauty (Nymphea stellata
and Nymphea gigantea), which give, by the gay dis-
play of their blue, pink, or crimson shades of flowers,
or by their pure white, a brilliant aspect to these lakes ;
and even the Pythagorean bean (Nelumbo nucifera)
sends occasionally its fine shield-like leaves and large
blossom and esculent fruits out of the still and shel-
tered waters. But how much could this splendor of
lake-vegetation be augmented if the reginal Victoria,
the prodigious Water-lily of the Amazon River, was
scattered and naturalized in these lakes, to expand
over their surface its stupendous leaves, and to send
forth its huge, snowy, and crimson, fragrant flowers.
178 FOREST CULTURE AND

It would add to the aliment which the natives now
obtain from these lakes and swamps by diving for the
roots and fruits of the Nymphe, or for the tubers of
Heleocharis sphacelata, of species of Aponogeton, or
by uprooting the starchy rhizomes of Typha augusti-
folia (the Bullrush), when eager of adding a vegetable
compound to their diet of Unio shells, or of water-
fowls and fishes, all abounding on these favorite places
of their resort. Trapa bispinosa, already living, like
the Victoria, in the tanks of our conservatories, ought,
with Trapa natans, for the sake of its nuts, not only
to be naturalized in the waters of the north, but also
in the lagoons and swamps of the south. Around
these lakes Screw-Pines (Pandanus spiralis and Pan-
danus aquaticus) may often be seen to emerge from
the banks, the latter, as recorded already by Leich-
hardt, always indicative of permanent water. The
young top-parts of the stems of these Pandans, when
subjected to boiling, become free of acridity, and thus
available, in cases of emergency, for food. Opilia
amentacea and the weeping Eugenia eucalyptoides,
together with a native cucumber (Cucumis jucunda),
are here among the few plants yielding edible fruit.
Purslane (Portulaca oleracea) abounds, and in sandy
soil it is found pleasantly acidulous. It will always
be acceptable, as a salad or spinach, especially in affec-
tions from scurvy, and its amylaceous seeds might,
in cases of distress, be readily gathered for food. A
delicious tall perennial spinach (Chenopodium aurica-
mum) is not unfrequent. Beyond one kind of San-
darach Callitris no Pines exist in the north, except
the Araucaria Greyi, noticed on a circumscribed spot
gn the Glenelg river, The true Bamboo (Bambusa
EUCALYPTUS TREES, 179

arundinacea) lines, as far as yet discovered, only the
banks of a few of the rivers of Arnhems-land.

To the pastoral settler, for whom more particularly
the generally open Eucalyptus country or the treeless
or partly scrubby tracts are eligible, it must be of sig-
nificance that the rainfall occurs with frequency during
the hottest part of the year. Hence, during the Sum-
mer, grass and herbage is pushing forth with extra-
ordinary rapidity and exuberance, while a judicious
burning at the cooler season, together with the effect
of regular dews, is certain to produce fresh forage
during thedryer months. An almost endless variety
of perennial nutritious grasses, allied to Indian spe-
cies, or even identical with them, are known to exist.
The basaltic downs of the north and north-west pro-
duce almost precisely the same vegetation which has
rendered Darling and Peak Downs so famed in the
east. This almost absolute identity of plants is a suf-
ficient indication of great semblance of climate, for
which the rise of the country, though one not very
considerable, to some extent may account. On the
ranges which divide the waters of the east coast from
those of Carpentaria the vine luxuriates; its fruit,
indeed, suffers occasionally from frost.

How far the tract south of the more littoral north-
ern country may continue to bear prevailingly the
features of fertility cannot be predicated. There can
be no greater fallacy than to prejudge an untraversed
country—a fallacy to which explorers are prone, and
which, in some instances, has retarded advancement
of geographical discoveries and of new locations of
permanent abodes, while, in other instances, it has
led to disastrous consequences. <A country should be
180 FOREST CULTURE AND

judged with caution. Even from elevations compar-
atively inconsiderable, as such nearly always proved
away from the eastern coast, the orb of vision is lim-
ited. A traveler may, buoyant with hope, commence
his new daily conquest on the delightful natural lawns
or the verdant slopes of a trap formation ; and, before
many hours’ ride, he may, to his dismay, be brought
without water to a bivouac between the sand - waves
of decomposed barren rocks. But as suddenly a few
hours’ perseverance may bring him again into geo-
logical regions of fertility when he least expected it;
smiling landscapes may again burst into his view,
and he may establish his next camp on limpid water,
sufficient for the requirements of a future city. The
nature of a country is not ruled by climate and lati-
tude alone, but quite as much, if not more, by its
geological structure. Glancing on the map of an un-
explored country, we are apt to take in our conject-
ures the former alone for a guide, until the latter, by
actual field-operations, becomes our stronghold in to-
pographical mapping. It would thus be unsafe to as-
sume-that the great western half of the interior consists
mainly of desolate, uninhabitable desert-country, or
even to contend that the reappearance on Termination
Lake, or on the Murchison river, of so very many of
the plants which give to the saltbush country, or the
Mallee and Brigalow scrubs, on the extensive depres-
sion of the Darling system, their physiognomy, neces-
sitates their uninterrupted extension from the rear of
Arnhems-land to the Murray Desert, or to Shark Bay.
From demonstrating-facts like these we dare no more
infer but that likely many similar tracts of flat coun-
try are stretching over portions of the wide interven-
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 181

ing spaces. But who will predict more ? May not
the large system of salt lakes formed by the drainage
of rain into cavities of saline flats be found limited to
the less distant portions of the interior of Western
Australia, and may it not thus, by a gradual rise of
the ground (evidently manifest northerly), give place
to a system of fresh-water lakes or lagoons, or even of
such springs as rewarded the exertions of the keenly-
searching explorers west of Lake Eyre ? And although
it must be admitted that no ranges simultaneously
lofty and wooded, and thus originating springs and
rivulets for the formation of larger rivers, are likély
to exist to any extent in the extra-tropical part of the
western interior, because such rivers have not found
their way to the coast; yet it is still possible, and
rather probable, that mountains as high, and much
less bare than Gawler Range, and even much more
extensive, may give rise to interior water-courses,
along which the dwellings.of new colonists may be
established, and to which our pasture-animals may
flock, but which, in their sluggish progress, cannot
force their way to the ocean, and are thus lost in nu-
merous more or less ample inland basins. Years hence,
on even less-favored spots, artesian borings may afford
the means of stay for a dense population, should, as
may be anticipated, mineral riches prove to be scat-
tered not merely over the vicinity of the west coast
and Spencer’s Gulf, but also over interjacent areas of
geological similarity. York’s Peninsula, close to set-
tlements, was long left an uninhabited and desolate
spot until its richness of copper-ore was disclosed.
So other unmapped parts of Australia are also likely
to prove rich; and, although equal facilities for the

*o
182 FOREST CULTURE AND

transit of the mineral treasures would not always
exist, its discovery would be certain to lead to the
occupation of the country and to the extension of
pastoral colonization, until an increasing population
and augmented conveniences for traffic could turn
mineral wealth, however distantly located, advanta-
geously to account. But how vastly might not any
barren tracts of the interior be improved, and how
many a lordly possession be founded, by patient in-
dustry and intelligent judgment! Storage of water,
raising of woods, dissemination of perennial fodder-
plants, will create alone marvellous changes; and for
these operations means are readily enough at com-
mand. Even the scattering of the grains of the com-
mon British Orache (Atriplex patulum), an annual but
autumnal plant, would, on the barest ground, realize
fodder for sheep; and the number of plants which for
such purpose could be chosen are legion. The storage
of rain-water might, in any rising valley, be so effect-
ed as to render it, simply by gravitation, available
for irrigating purposes.

As a curious fact, it may be instanced that, in some
of the waterless sandy regions of South Africa, the
copious naturalization of melon - plants has afforded
the means of establishing halting-places in a desert
country. On the sandy shores of the Great Bight,
and also anywhere in the dry interior, such plants
might be easily established. The avidity with which
the natives at Escape Cliffs preserved the melon-
seeds, after they once had recognized the value of
their new treasure, holds out the prospect of the grad-
ual diffusion of such vegetable boons oyer much unset>
tled country,
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 188

No part of Australia has the marked peculiarities
of its vegetation so strongly expressed, and no part
of this great country produces so rich an assemblage
of species within a limited area as the remotest
south-western portion of the continent. Indeed, the.
southern extremity of Africa is the only part of the
globe in which an equally varied display of vegetable
forms is found within equally narrow precincts, and
endowed also with an equal richness of endemic gen-
era, It is beyond the scope of this brief treatise to
enter fully into a detailed exposition of the constitu-
ents of the south-western flora. It may mainly suffice
to view such of the vegetable products as are drawn
already into industrial use, or are likely to be of avail
for the purpose. Foremost in this respect stands,
perhaps, the Mahogany-Eucalypt (Eucalyptus margi-
nata). The timber of this tree exhibits the won-
derful quality of being absolutely impervious to the
inroads of the limnoria, the teredo, and chelura—those
minute marine creatures so destructive to wharves,
jetties, and any work of naval architecture exposed
to the water of the sea; it equally resists the attacks
of termites. In these properties the Red Gum-tree
of our own country largely shares. The Mahogany-
Eucalypt has, in the Botanic Gardens of this city,
been brought for the first time largely under cultiva-
tion, and as, clearly, the natural supply of this impor-
tant timber will, sooner or later, proye inadequate to
the demanded requirements, it must be regarded as
a wise measure of the goyernments of France and
Italy now to establish this tree on the Mediterranean
shores-~a measure for which still greater facilities
are herg locally offered,
184 FOREST CULTURE AND

The Tuart (Eucalyptus gomphocephala) is another
of the famed artisan’s woods of south-western Aus-
tralia. The Karri (Eucalyptus colossea or diversicolor)
attains, in favorable spots, a height of four hundred
feet. Eucalyptus megacarpa constitutes the Blue
Gum-tree, which rivals that of Tasmania and Victo-
ria in size, but is otherwise very distinct. Its timber,
as well as that of the Tuart, on account of their hard-
ness, are employed for tramways and other works of
durability. The fragrant wood of several species of
Santalum forms an article of commercial export.
Some kinds of Casuarina, quite peculiar to that part
of Australia, furnish superior wood for shingles and
for a variety of implements. Several species of Aca-
cia, especially Acacia acuminata, the raspberry-scented
Wattle, equally restricted to the south-west coast,
yield fragrant and remarkably solid wood and a pure
gum. To this part of Australia was naturally also re-
stricted the Acacia lophantha, which has, for the sake
of its easy and rapid growth and its umbrageous fo-
liage, assumed such importance, even beyond Austra-
lia, for temporary shelter- plantations. Many other
products, such as gum-resins, sandarach, tanner’s
hark, all of great excellence, are largely available ;
but these substances show considerable similarity to
those obtained in other Australian colonies.

The extraordinary abundance, however, of the Xan-
thorrhoeas through most parts of the south-west terri-
tory gives special interest to the fact (1845) promul-
gated by Stenhouse, that anthrazotic, or nitro-picric
acid—a costly dye—may, with great ease and little
cost, be prepared from the resin of these plants. In-
deed, this is the richest source for this acid, the resin
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 185

yielding half its weight in dye. Fiber of great excel-
lence and strength is obtained from the bark of Pim-
elea clavata, a bush widely distributed there. It
resembles that of bast from Pimelea axiflora in Gipps
Land, and that from Pimelea microcephala of the Mur-
ray and Darling desert. A Fern-palm (Zamia Fraseri)
attains in West Australia a height of fifteen feet. It
is there, like some congeners of America and South
Africa, occasionally sacrificed for the manufacture of
a peculiar starch, though the export of the stems (and
perhaps of those of the Xanthorrheas also) would
prove much more profitable, inasmuch as these, when
deprived of their noble crown of leaves, though not
of their roots, will endure a passage of many months,
even should the plants be half a century old. Such
any wool-vessel might commodiously take to Europe.
This alimentary Fern-palm, well appreciated by the
aborigines for the sake of its nuts, together with a
true kind of Yam (Dioscorea hastifolia), the only plant
on which the natives, in their pristine state, anywhere
in Australia, bestowed a crude cultivation, are, with
species of Borya, Sowerbeea, Hemodorum, Ricinocar-
pus, Macarthuria, Chloanthes, Aphanopetalum, Xylo-
melum, Caleana, Calectasia, Petrophila, Leschenaul-
tia, Pseudanthus, Nematolepis, Nuytsia (the terres-
trial mistletoe), Leucoleena, Commersonia, Rulingia,
Keraudrenia, Mirbelia, Gastrolobium, Labichea, Meli-
chrus, Monotaxis, Actinotus, and Stypandra, remark-
able for their geographical distribution ; because, as
far as we are hitherto aware, these West Australian
genera have no representatives in the wide interja-
cent space until we approach toward the eastern, or,
in a few instances, to the northern regions of Austra-
186 FOREST CULTURE AND

lia, Zamia alone having been noticed in South Austra-
lia (Zamia Macdonnellii), but there as an exceedingly
local plant. “Neither climate nor geologic considera-
tions explain this curious fact of phytogeography.
Over some of the healthy tracts of scrub-country, to-
ward the south-west coast, poisonous species of Gas-
trolobium (Gastrol bilobum, G. oxylobioides, G. caly-
cinum, G. callistachys) are dispersed. These plants
have, in some localities, rendered the occupation of
country for pastoral pursuits impossible, but these
poison-plants are mostly confined to barren spots, and
it is not unlikely that, by repeated burnings, and by
the raising of perennial fodder-plants, they could be
suppressed, and finally extirpated. Fortunately, in
no other parts of Australia Gastrolobium occurs, ex-
cept on the inland tract from Attack Creek to the Sut-
tor River, where flocks must be guarded against ac-
cess to the scrub-patches harboring the only tropical
species (Gastrolobium grandiflorum). The deadly ef-
fect occasionally produced by Lotus Australis, a herb
with us of very wide distribution, and extending also
to New Caledonia, and the cerebral derangements
manifested by pasture animals, which feed on the Dar-
ling River pea (Swainsona Greyana), need yet extensive
investigation, but may find their explanation in the
fact that the organic poisonous principle is only local-
ly, under conditions yet obscure, developed ; or in
the probable circumstance that, like in a few other
leguminous plants, the deleterious properties are
strongly concentrated in the seed. The gorgeous des-
ert-pea (Clianthus Dampierii), which, in its capricious
distribution, has been traced sparingly from the
Lachlan Riyer to the north-west coast, offers still tg
seed-collectors q |pcrative gain,
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 187

A prominent aspect in the vegetation of south-west
Australia emanates from the comparatively large num-
ber of singularly beautiful Banksia-tree, preponderant
there as the arborous Grevilleg in North Australia.
The existence of but two of that genus, Banksia Aus-
tralis, and B. ornata, in the extensive tract of interior
and coast land, from the head of the Australian Bight,
to the vicinity of Port Philip, renders the occurrence
of an increased number of trees of this kind in East
Ausiralia again still more odd. ‘Rutaceous and good-
eniaceous plants, though in no part of the Australian
continent rare, attain in the south-west their greatest
numerical development, and should not be passed si-
lently, or, like Epacridez, as merely ornamental plants,
though still so rare in our gardens ; but these elegant
plants deserve also attention for their diaphoretic prop-
erties, or for the bitter tonic principle which pervades
nearly all the species of the two orders. Stylidez are
here still more numerous than in our north, and com-
prise forms of great neatness; while sundews (Dro-
sere) are also found to be more frequently than in
anyo ther part of Australia, and indeed of the globe.
When, glittering in their adamantine dew, they re-
appear as the harbingers of Spring from year to year,
they are greeted always anew with admiration. But
the greatest charm of the vegetation consists in the
hundreds of myrtaceous bushes peculiar to the west,
all full of aromatic oil ; among these again, the feath-
er-flowered numerous Verticordig, the crimson Calo-
thamni, and the healthy Calythrices vie with each
other as ornaments, Still also of this order many gor-
geous plants exist in other parts of, especially extra-
tropical Australia, The numerous bushes of Legus
188 FOREST CULTURE AND

minosz, and Proteace, in south-west Australia, are
also charming. The introduction of all these into
European conservatories might be made the object of
profitable employment. Annual herbs of extreme
minuteness, belonging chiefly to Composit, Umbelli-
ferx, Stylidez, and Centrolepidez, are here, as in oth-
er parts of extra-tropical Australia, in their aggregate
more numerous than minute phanerogamic plants in
any other part of the globe. A line of demarcation
for including the main mass of the south-west Austra-
lian vegetation may almost be drawn from the Mur-
chison River, or Shark Bay, to the western extremity
of the Great Bight; because to these points penetrates
the usual interior vegetation, which thence ranges to
Sturt’s Creek, to the Burdekin, Darling, and Murray
rivers, while the special south-west Australian flora
ceases to exist as a whole beyond the limits indicated.
The marine flora of south-west Australia is like-
wise eminently prolific in specific forms, perhaps more_
so than that ofany other shore. Many of the alge are
endemic, others extend along the whole southern coast
and Tasmania, where again a host of species proved pe-
culiar ; some are also extra-Australian. The whole
eastern coast contrarily, and also the northern and the
north-western, with the exception of a few isolated
spots, suchas Albany Island, contrast with the southern
coast as singularly poor in algw. Ina work exclusively
devoted to the elucidation of the marine plants of Aus-
tralia—a work which as an ornament of phytograph-
ic literature stands unsurpassed, and which necessitat-
ed lengthened laborious researches of its illustrious
author, the late Professor Harvey, here on the spot—
the specific limits of not less than eight hundred alga
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 189

are fixed. Some of these are not without their par-
ticular uses. A few yield caragaheen, all bromine and
iodine. Macrocystis pyrifera, the great kelp, which
may be seen floating in large masses outside Port
Philip Heads, attains the almost incredible length of
many hundred feet, while a single plant of the leath-
ery, broad Urvillea potatorum constitutes a heavy
load for a pack-horse.

The wide, depressed interior, once supposed to be
an untraversable desert, consists, as far as hitherto
ascertained, much less of sandy ridges than of sub-
saline or grassy flats, largely interspersed with tracts
of scrub, and occasionally broken by comparatively
timberless ranges. The great genus Acacia, which
gives to Australia alone about three hundred species
(and, therefore, specific forms twice as numerous as
that of any Australian generic type), sends its shrubs
and trees also in masses over this part of the country,
where, with their harsh and hard foliage, they are
well capable to resist the effect of the high tempera-
ture during the season of aridity, while they are
equally contented with the low degree of warmth to
which, during nights of the cool season, the dry at-
mosphere becomes reduced. Handsome bushes of
Eremophila, with blossoms of manifold hue, decorate
the scrubs throughout the whole explored interior.
Among the desert Cassie two simple-leaved kinds are
remarkable. Of the Acaciz, none here, except A.
Farnesiana, have pinnated leaves, and even one is
leafless ; the pinnated: Acacia being restricted to the
more littoral tracts, and even there from the Great
Bight to Guichen Bay entirely absent. If shelter
plantations of the rapidly-growing Eucalypts, Acacias,
190 FOREST CULTURE AND

and Casuarinas were raised, a vast variety of useful
plants could be reared along the water-courses of the’
more central parts of Australia. Saltbushes, in great
variety, stretch far inland, and this is the forage on
which flocks so admirably thrive. Probably the ex-
tensive Asiatic steppes have to boast of no greater di-
versity of salsolaceous plants than our own. WNever-
theless, even here much could be added to the pro-
ductiveness of these pasturages by the introduction of
other perennial fodder herbs. Grasses, wherever they
occur, are varied, and a large share is perennial,
nutritious, and widely diffused. As corroborative,
it may be instanced that Anthistiria ciliata, the
common kangaroo-grass, almost universally ranges
over Australia, and thus also over the central steppes
of the continent. It extends, indeed, to Asia and
North Africa also. Besides, through the interior,
grasses, especially of Panicum and Andropogon, are
numerous, either on the oases, or interspersed with
‘shrubs on barren spots. Festuca or Triodia irritans,
the porcupine-grass of the settlers, is restricted to the
sands of the extra-tropical latitudes ; Festuca or Triodia
viscida, chiefly to the sandstone table-lands of the
tropics. /

Only in the south-eastern parts of the continent,
and in Tasmania, are the mountains rising to alpine
elevations. Mount Hotham, in Victoria, and Moun;
Kosciusko, in New South Wales, form the culminat
ing points, each slightly exceeding seven thousand
feet in height. In the ravines of these summits
lodge perennial glaciers ; at six thousand feet snow
remains unmelted for nearly the whole of the year,
and snow-storms may occur in these elevations dur-
EUCALYPTUS TREES, . 191

ing the midst of Summer. At five thousand feet
the vegetation of shrubs generally commences, and
up to this height ascend two Eucalypts, Eucalyptus
coriaces and Gunnii, forming dense and extensive
thickets ; E. coriacez assuming, however, in lower
valleys, huge dimensions. Both these, with most of
our alpine plants,. would deserve transplanting to
middle Europe, and to other countries of the
temperate zone, where they would well cope with
the vicissitudes of the climate. In Tasmania, the
Winter snow-line sinks considerably lower, and in its
moister clime many alpine plants descend there along
the torrents and rivulets to the base of the mountains
which here are constantly clinging to cold elevations.
Mount William is the only sub-alpine height isolated
in Victoria from the great complex of snowy mount-
ains, but it produces, beyond Eucalyptus alpina, and
Pultenza rosea, which are confined to the crest of that
royal mountain, only Celmisia longifolia and little else
as the mark of an alpine or rather subalpine flora.
Celmisia also is one of the féw representatives of cold
heights in the Blue Mountains ; and from New Eng-
land we know only Scleranthus biflorus, a cushion-
like plant, exquisitely adapted for margining garden
plots, and Gualtheria hispida, as generally indicating
spots on which snow lodges for some of the Winter
months. The mountains of Queensland would need
in their tropical latitudes a greater height than they
possess for nourishing analogous forms of life, but the
truly alpine vegetation of the high mountains of Tas-
mania contrasts in some important respects with that
of the Australian Alps—namely, therein that under
the prevalence of a much higher degree of humidity,
192 FOREST CULTURE AND

plants which delight to be bathed in clouds, or in the
dense vapors of the surrounding Fern- tree valleys,
are much more universal; and that the number of
peculiar alpine genera is much. greater than here.
Thus, while in Tasmania the magnificent Evergreen
Beech (Fagus Cunninghami) covers many of the
ranges up to sub-alpine rises, it predominates as a for-
est-tree in Victoria only at the remotest sources of
the Yarra, the Latrobe, and the Goulburn rivers, and
on Mount Baw-Baw. ‘To this outpost of the Austra-
lian Alps (now so accessible to metropolitan tourists)
are restricted also several plants, such as Oxalis Ma-
gellanica and Libertia Lawrencii, which are almost
universal on all the higher hills of Tasmania. Fagus
Cunninghami, though descending into our Fern-
tree ravines, transgresses nowhere the Victorian land-
boundaries, but a noble fagus-forest, constituted by a
distinct and equally evergreen species, Fagus Moorei,
crowns the high ranges on which the Bellinger and
M’Leay riversrise. This, however, the snowy moun-
tains of Tasmania and of continental Australia have
in common, that the majority of the alpine plants are
not representing genera peculiar to colder countries,
but exhibit hardy forms, referable to endemic Austra-
lian genera, or such as are allied to them. So, as al-
ready remarked, we possess alpine species, even of
Eucalyptus and of Acacia, besides of hibbertia, oxylo-
bium, bossizea, pultenzea, eriostemon, boronia didiscus,
epacris, leucopogon, prostanthera, grevillea, hakea,
persoonia, pimelea, kunzea, baeckea, stackhousia,
mitrasacme, xanthosia, coprosma, velleya, prasophyl-
lum; yet anemone, caltha, antennaria, gaultheria,
alchemilla, seseli, cenothera, huanaca, abrotanella,
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 193

ligusticum, astelia, gunnera, and other northern or
western types, are not altogether missing, though
nowhere else to be found in Australia but in glacial
regions.

About halfa hundred of the highland plants are
strictly peculiar to Victoria; the rest prove mainly
identical with Tasmanian species ; but a few of ours,
not growing in the smaller sister-land, are, strange
as it may appear, absolutely conspecific with Euro-
pean forms. Rather more than: one hundred of the
lowland plants ascend, however, to the glacial regions ;
some of these are simultaneously desert-species,

The only genus of plants absolutely peculiar to the
Victorian territory, Wittsteinia, occurs as a dwarf sub-
alpine plant, of more herbaceous than woody growth,
restricted to the summits of Mount Baw-Baw; this,
moreover, remained hitherto the only representative
of vacciniee in all Australia; it produces, like most
of the order, edible berries.

The verdant Summer- herbage of valleys, which
snow covers during the Winter months, will render
with increasing value of land-estates these free, airy,
and still retreats in time fully occupied as pasturage
during the warmer part of the year. Here, in shel:
tered glens, we have the means of raising all the
plants delighting in the coolest clime. Rye-culture
could probably be carried on at considerable eleva-
tion.

Of all the phanerogamic plants of Tasmania, about
one hundred and thirty are endemic; of those about
eighty are limited to alpine elevations, or descend
from thence only into cool, umbrageous valleys. The
generic types peculiar to the island are again almost
194 FoREST CULTURE AND

all alpine (milligania, campynema, hewardia, ptery-
gopappus, tetracarpsea, anodopetalum, cystanthe, pri.
onotis, microcachrys, diselma, athrotaxis, pherosphz-
ra, bellendena, cenarrhenes, archeria), only acradenia
and agastachys belonging seemingly to the lowlands,
but show at once a fondness for a wet, insular clime.
The few Tasmanian genera, represented besides only
in Victoria, are richea, diplarrhena, drymophila, jun-
cella. In the Tasmanian highlands flora endemic
shrubby asters and epacrides, and the singular endem-
ic pines of various genera, constitute a marked feat-
ure. A closer and more extended inquiry into the
geological relation of great assemblages of vegetation
will shed probably more light on the enigmatic laws
by which the dispersion of plants is ruled. Austra-
lian forms predominate also in Tasmania, at snowy
heights, so Eucalyptus gunnii, E. coccifera, and E.
urnigera, The famous Huon-pine (Dacrydium Frank-
lini), the Palmheath (Richea pandanifolia), the celery.
topped pine (Phyllocladus rhomboidalis), and the de-
ciduous beech (Fagus Gunnii) are among the most
striking objects of its insular vegetation. Mosses,
lichenastra, lichens, and conspicuous fungs abound
both in alpine and low regions ; indeed, cryptogamic
plants, except Algs and microscopic fungs, are no-
where in Australia really frequent except in Tasmania,
in the Australian Alps, and in the Fern-tree gilens of
Victoria and part of New South Wales. The Musk-
tree (Aster argophyllus) of Tasmania and south-east
Australia is the largest of the few trees produced by
the vast order of composite in any part of the globe,
while Prostanthera lasianthos, its companion, exhibits
the only real tree known in the extensive family of
BUCALYPTUS TREES. 195

Labiate. The almost exclusive occupation of vast
littoral tracts of Gippsland, and some of the adjoining
islands, by the dwarf Xanthorrheea minor, is remark-
able. Mistletoes do not extend to Tasmania, though
over every other part of Australia; neither the Nar-
doo (Marsilea quadrifolia), of melancholic celebrity,
though to be found in every part of the continent, and
abounding in innumerable varieties throughout the
depressed parts of the interior. Equisetacez occur
nowhere. The total of the species to be admitted as
well-defined, and hitherto known, from all parts of
Australia, approaches (with exclusion of microscopic
fungi) to ten thousand.

It has been deemed of sufficient importance to ap-
pend to this brief memoir an index of all the trees
hitherto discovered in any part of Australia.* Such
statistics lead to reflection and comparison. They also
bring more prominently before the contemplative
noind the real access which in any branch of special
knowledge may have been obtained. In this instance
it is the only table with which this document has been
burdened, though kindred lists might have readily
been elaborated. Nor would this imperfect sketch of
Australian vegetation have been extended to any de-
tailed enumerations whatever did not the trees im-
press on the vegetation of each country its most dis-
tinctive feature, and had we not learned how great a
treasure each land possesses in its timber— whether
as raw product to artisans or as objects of therapeutic
application, whether as material for the products of
manifold factories or as the source of educts in the
chemical laboratory ; whether as the means of afford-
ing employment to the workman, or even as the me-

 

* Index omitted,
196 FOREST CULTURE AND

dium for regulating the climate. May we revert only
to the circumstance, as elucidating the great physio-
graphic characters of countries and their mutual re-
lation, that notwithstanding the close proximity of
New Zealand, none of its trees (though very many of
its herbs) are positively identical with any observed
in Australia; and yet, hundreds of ours can in no
way be distinguished from Indian trees. Moreover,
in a philosophical contemplation of the nature of any
country and the history of its creation, our attention
is likely to be in the first instance engaged in a survey
of the constituents of its pristine forests, and greatly
is it to be feared that in ages hence, when much of
the woods will have sunk under ruthless axes, the
deductions of advanced knowledge thereon will have
to be based solely on evidence early placed on record.

The marvellous height of some of the Australian,
and especially Victorian trees, has become the subject
of closer investigation since, of late, particularly
through the miners’ tracks, easier access has been
afforded to the back-gullies of our mountain system.
Some astounding data, supported by actual measure-
ments, are now on record. The highest tree previ-
ously known was a Karri - Eucalyptus (Eucalyptus
colossea), measured by Mr. Pemberton Walcott, in
one of the delightful glens of the Warren River of
western Australia, where it rises to approximately
four hundred feet high. Into the hollow trunk of
this Karri three riders, with an additional pack-horse,
could enter and turn in it without dismounting. On
the desire of the writer of these pages, Mr. D. Boyle
measured a fallen tree of Eucalyptus amygdalina, in
the deep recesses of Dandenong, and obtained for it
EUCALYPTUS TREES, 197

the length of four hundred and twenty feet, with
proportions of width, indicated in a design ofa monu-
mental structure placed in the Exhibition ; while Mr.
G. Klein took the measurement of a Eucalyptus on
the Black Spur, ten miles distant from Healesville,
four hundred and eighty feet high! Mr. E. B. Heyne
obtained at Dandenong as measurements of height of
a tree of Eucalyptus amygdalina: Length of stem
from the base to the first branch, two hundred and
ninety-five feet; diameter of the stem at the first
branch, four feet; length of stem from first branch
to where its top portion was broken off, seventy feet;
diameter of the stem where broken off, three feet ;
total length of stem up to place of fracture, three hun-
dred and sixty - five feet; girth of stem three feet
from the surface, forty-one feet. A still thicker tree
measured, three feet from the base, fifty-three feet in
circumference. Mr. George W. Robinson ascertained,
in the back-ranges of Berwick, the circumference of
a tree of Eucalyptus amygdalina to be eighty - one
feet at a distance of four feet from the ground, and
supposes this Eucalypt, toward the sources of the
Yarra and Latrobe rivers, to attain a height of half
a thousand feet. The same gentleman found Fagus
Cunninghami to gain a height of two hundred feet
and a circumference of twenty-three feet.

It is not at all likely that in these isolated inquiries
chance has led to the really highest trees, which the
most secluded and the least accessible spots may still
conceal. It seems, however, almost beyond dispute,
that the trees of Australia rival in length, though evi-
dently not in thickness, even the renowned forest-gi-
ants of California, Sequoia Wellingtonia, the highest

10
198 FOREST CULTURE AND

of which, as far as the writer is aware, rise in their
favorite haunts at the Sierra Nevada to about four
hundred and fifty feet. Still, one of the mammoth
trees measured, it is said, at an estimated height of
three hundred feet, eighteen feet in diameter! Thus
to Victorian trees for elevation the palm must appa-
rently be conceded. A standard of comparison we
possess in the spire of the Munster of Strasbourg, the
highest of any cathedral of the globe, which sends
its lofty pinnacle to the height of four hundred and
forty-six feet, or in the great pyramid of Cheops,
four hundred and eighty feet high, which, if raised
in our ranges, would be overshadowed probably by
Eucalyptus-trees.

The enormous height attained by not isolated, buf
vast masses of our timber-trees in the rich diluvial
deposits of sheltered depressions within Victorian
ranges, finds its principal explanation, perhaps, in the
circumstance that the richness of the soil is combined
with humid geniality of the climate, never sinking
to the colder temperature of Tasmania, nor rising to
a warmth less favorable to the strong development of
these trees in New South Wales, nor ever reduced to
that comparative dryness of air which even to some
extent, in the mountain-ravines of South Australia, is
experienced. The absence of living gigantic forms of
animal life amidst these the hugest forms of the vege-
table world is all the more striking.

Statistics of actual measurement of trees compiled
in various parts of the globe would be replete with
deep interest, not merely to science, but disclose also,
in copious instances, magnitudes of resources but lit-
tle understood up to the present day. , Not merely,
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 199

however, in their stupendous altitude, but also in
their celerity of growth, we have, in all probability,
to accede to Australian trees the prize. Extensive
comparisons instituted in the Botanic Garden of this
metropolis prove several species of Eucalyptus, more
particularly Eucalyptus globulus, and Ecalyptus obli-
qua, as well as certain Acacias —for instance, Acacia
decurrens, or Acacia mollissima—far excelling in their
ratio of development any extra-Australian trees, even
on dry and exposed spots, such into which spontane-
ously our Blue Gum-tree would not penetrate. This
marvellous quickness of growth, combined with a
perfect fitness to resist drought, has rendered many
of our trees famed abroad, especially so in countries
where the supply of fuel or of hard woods is not read--
ily attainable, or where for raising shelter, like around
the Cinchona-plantations of India, the early and copi-
ous command of tall vegetation is of imperative im-
portance. To us here this ought to be a subject of
manifold significance. I scarcely need refer to the
fact that for numerous unemployed the gathering of
Eucalyptus-seeds, of which a pound weight suffices
to raise many thousand trees, might be a source of
lucrative and extensive employment; but on this I
wish to dwell: that in Australian vegetation we prob-
ably possess the means of obliterating the rainless zone
of the globe, to spread at last woods over our deserts,
and thereby to mitigate the distressing drought,
and to annihilate, perhaps, even that occasionally ex-
cessive dry heat evolved by the sun’s rays from the
naked ground throughout extensive regions of the
interior, and wafted with the current of air to the
east and south—miseries from which the prevalence
200 FOREST CULTURE AND

of sea-breezes renders the more littoral tracts of West
and North Australia almost free. But in the econo-
my of nature the trees, beyond affording shade and
shelter, and retaining humidity to the soil, serve
other great purposes. ‘Trees, ever active in sending
their roots to the depths, draw unceasingly from below
the surface-strata those mineral elements of vegetable
nutrition on which the life of plants absolutely de-
pends, and which, with every dropping leaf, is left as
a storage of aliment for the subsequent vegetation.
How much lasting good could not be effected, then,
by mere scattering of seeds of our drought-resisting
Acacias, and Eucalypts, and Casuarinas, at the termi-
nation of the hot season along any’ water-course, or
even along the crevices of rocks, or over bare sands
or hard clays, after refreshing showers? Eyen the
rugged escarpments of the desolate ranges of Tunis,
Algiers, and Morocco might become wooded; even
the Sahara itself, if it could not be conquered and
rendered habitable, might have the extent of fts oases
vastly augmented ; fertility might be secured again
to the Holy Land, and rain to the Asiatic plateau, or
the desert of Atacama, or timber and fuel be furnish-
ed to Natal and La Plata. An experiment instituted
on a bare ridge near our metropolis demonstrates
what may be done.

Not Australia alone, but some other countries, have
judiciously taken advantage of the facilities afforded
by Australian tree-vegetation for raising woods —an
object which throughout the interior might be ini-
tiated by rendering this an additional purpose of the
expeditions to be maintained in the field for territo-
rial and physiographical exploration; and more, it
EUCALYPTUS TREES. 201

might deserve the reflection of the Legislature, which
allots to the pastoral tenants their expansive tracts of
country, whether or not along with squatting pur-
suits —indeed, for the actual benefit of the pastoral
occupant himself the inexpensive first steps for gen-
eral forest-culture in the woodless regions should be
commenced.

Within the ranges which produce these colossal
trees but few habitations exist; indeed, we might
traverse a line of a thousand miles as yet without a
dwelling. The clime is salubrious ; within the shel-
tered glens it cannot in excellence be surpassed. Hot
winds, from which our exposed plains, as well as any
rises of northern and western aspect, so much suffer,
never reach the still and mild vales of the forests ;
frosts are only experienced in the higher regions.
Speaking of Victoria especially, it is safe to assert that
there alone many thuusand square miles of mount-
ainous country, timbered with Stringy-bark trees (Eu-
calyptus obliqua) are as yet lying dormant for any
other but isolated mining operations. And yet, might
not families which desire to strike out a path of inde-
pendent prosperity, which seek a simple patriarchal
life in # salubrious locality of seclusion, and which
command, the needful strength of labor within their
own circle, choose these happy glens as their perma-
nent abodes? Though the timbered rises of the ranges
may be as yet unlucrative for cultivation, or even be
sterile, the valleys are generally rich, irrigated by
clear brooks, and spacious enough for isolated homes,
and the limited number of pasture animals pertain-
ing to them. The costlier products of culture might
be realized, especially so in the Fern-tree glens ; tea,

o
202 FOREST CULTURE AND

and possibly cinchona, and coffee also; so, lucrative
fibres, dye-plants of easy growth and simple prepara-
tion, as instanced by grass-cloth, or madder ; or medi-
cinal plants, such as senna, and various herbs, or, per-
haps, even the Erythroxylon coca, a plant of almost
fabulous properties. Or should the settler prefer, be-
yond raising the simple requirements for his rural
life, to devote his attention solely to the gain which
the surrounding timber treasuries are certain to offer,
he will find ample scope for his energy and industry.
The Eucalypts, as now proved by extensive and accu-
rate experiments, will yield him tar in abundance ;
they will furnish fibres, even those of Stringy-bark as
one of the cheapest and most extensively available
paper material. By afew simple appliances he may
secure, simultaneously with the tar, also wood-vine-
gar and wood-spirit; and these again might locally be
at once converted into dye materials and varnishes.
‘He might obtain potash from woods, and volatile oils
from the leaves of Eucalypts in almost any quantity,
by artless processes and with scarcely any cost. He
might gather the gum-resins and barks for either
medicinal or tanning purposes, or he might effect a
trade in Fern-trees ; he might shake the Eucalyptus
grains out of their capsules, and might secure locally
other mercantile substances far too numerous to be
enumerated here. Whoever may choose these ranges
as a permanent home, and may direct thoughtfully his
attention to the future, will recognize that the mere
scattering of the acorns of the Cork-tree or the seeds of
the Red Cedar over cleared and yet sheltered ground,
or the planting of the vine and olive, will yield to his
descendants sources of great riches.
EUCALYPTUS TREES, 208

In closing these concise and somewhat chaotic sug-
gestions, which scarcely admit of methodical arrange-
ment, unless by expansion into the chapters of a vol-
ume, we may—indulging in a train of thought—pass
from special to general considerations,

Belgium, one of the most densely populated of all
countries, and yet one of the most prosperous, nourish-
ed within an area less than one half that of Tasmania
a population three times exceeding that of all the
Australian colonies ; yet one fifth of the Belgian ter-
ritory consists of forests. Not to any considerable
extent smaller than Europe, our continent is likely to
support in ages hence a greater population ; because,
while here no frigid zone excludes any portion of the
territory from productiveness, or reduces it anywhere
to very circumscribed limits, it embraces a wide trop-
ical tract, destined to yield us products nowhere to be
raised under the European sky. The comparatively
unbroken uniformity of vast tracts of Australia cer-
tainly restricts us for the magnificent sceneries and
the bracing air of the countries of our youth here to
the hilly coast-tracts ; but still we have not to endure
the protracted colds of middle and northern European
Winters, nor to contend with the climatic difficulties
which beset tillage operations or pastoral pursuits,
and which, by patient perseverance, could not be
removed or be materially lessened.

While we are deprived of advantages so pleasing
and so important as those of large river communica-
tions, we enjoy great facilities for land traffic, facili-
ties to which every new discovery of coal-layers will
add.
204 FOREST CULTURE.

Judicious forest culture, appropriate to each zone,
will vastly ameliorate the clime, and provide for the:
dense location of our race; for transplanting of almost
every commodity, both of the vegetable and animal
empire, we possess, from the Alps to the Steppes, from
the cool mountain forests to the tropic jungles, condi-
tions and ample space.

River-waters, now flowing unutilized to the ocean,
when cast over the back plains, and artesian borings
also, will effect marvellous changes. Steam power
and the increased ingenuity of machinery applied to
cultivation will render the virgin soil extensively
productive with far less toil than in older countries,
while the teachings of science will guard us against
the rapacious systems of culture and the waste of fer-
tilizers which well-nigh involved ruin to many a land.
Of ferocious land animals Australia is free. We have
neither to encounter extensive hordes of savages to
dispute the possession of the soil, nor the still more
dangerous opposition of half-civilized barbarians, such
as for ages yet may obstruct the progress of civiliza-
tion in the great interior of Africa.

Our continent, it may be foretold prophetically, will
ere long be regarded of so high a territorial value that
no tract, however much disregarded now, will remain
unoccupied. Our continent, surrounded moreover by
the natural boundaries of three oceans, free and un-
connected, must advance, by extraneous influences
undisturbed, by ancient usages unretarded, to that
greatness to which British sovereignty will ever give
a firm stability,
 

 
FIFTH

ANNUAL CATALOGUE

OF THE

Santa Barbara College

Santa Barbara, California.

*10
(j:
Board of Wirectors,

1878-6.

Cou. W. W. HOLLISTER,
ELLWOOD COOPER,
CHAS. FERNALD,
JOHN P. STEARNS,
JOHN EDWARDS,
CHARLES E. HUSE,

F. W. FROST,
WILLIAM M. EDDY,

T. WALLACE MORE,

G. P. TEBBETTS.
CoD
Ce AG
Officers and Bammittees.

1875-6.

President.
ELLWOOD COOPER.

Greasuyer.
F. W. FROST.

Secnetayy,
G. P. TEBBETTS.

Hinance and Building Committee,
CHAS. FERNALD, CHARLES E. HUSE,
J. P. STEARNS, JOHN EDWARDS,
@. P. TEBBETTS.

Executive Committee,
ELLWOOD COOPER, T. WALLACE MORE,
Cot. W. W. HOLLISTER, F. W. FROST,
WILLIAM M. EDDY.
Board of Jnstructars,

PRINCIPAL.
ELLWOOD COOPER.

ASSOCIATE PRINCIPAL.

Mrs. ELLWOOD COOPER.

TEacHERS.
Pror. A. NEUMEYER, Miss LUCY E. WHITTON,
Pror. C.H. SILLIMAN, Miss L, K. PERSHING,
Pror. ALPHONSE BEL, Miss KATE BRONSON,
Pror. M. J. GORDON, Miss 8. L. ANDERSON.
Students _

OF THE

Santa Barbara College,

1875-76.

LIST OF PUPILS.
ACADEMIC COURSE.

Ayers, Jennie Des Granges, Otto
Bailard, Theresa E. Dimmick, Walter
Bailard, John , Dugdale, Horace C.
Barnard, Frank E. Dunne, James C.
Barnard, Nellie D. Duval, Charles 8.
Barham, Jobn H. Edwards, Anna
Borrowe, Fannie ¥dwards, Charles
Bowers, Anna A. Elwell, Frank _
Bowers, Demoss Fernald, Beatrice
Bowers, John Franklin, Anabel E.
Brastow, George B. Franklin,. Mrs,
Bradbury, Nora A. Frost, Clarinda
Bronson, Lulu Gibbs, Annie
Bronson, Kate Gibbs, George
Casebeere, Isbella, Gibbs, Laura W.
Castinos, Albert Gibbs, Lausian
Covk, Fairie Gibbs, Mrs, BE. Hi;
Cook, Nina Greenwell, Arty C,
Cooper Elten Greenwell, Charles B,
Cooper, Fannie Goss, Josephine

Conant, Mrs, T. 8. Hampton, Fannie
212

Hampton, Pallie
Hampton, Jeff.
Harrison, James K.
Haight, Charles B.
Harford, Freddie
Hatch, Mrs.
Hawley, Ernest 8.
Hawley, Lilian‘
Hawley, Jessie R.
Hawley, Mrs. T. R.
Hayne, Bennie
Hayne, Alston
Harris, Jake
Higgins, Fred. L.
Hill, Jessie

Huse, Alice R.
Johnson, Mackey
Kalisher, Fannie
Knapp, Sadia R.
Lake, George B.
Lake, Winnie
Low, Fannie ©
Lucas, Hattie M.
Mayhew, Jennie
McLaren, Anna
McLaren, Jennie
More, Belle

More, Mary

More, Wallace
More, Alex. S.
More, Willie
Newmayer, Bene
Newmayér, Bismarck
Newmayer, Lillie
Newmayer, Walter
Norway, William R.

SANTA BARBARA COLLEGE.

Olsen, Fred.

Olsen, Minnie
Pacheco, John
Perkins, Allie T.
Perkins, Grace F.
Perkins, Isabel D.
Perkins, May W.
Perin, Edith
Pierce, Charles D.
Pierce, Hiram
Riggen, Wijliam
Safford, Morton
Sawtelle, Vivia F.
Shaw, James B.
Skeels, Katie
Skeels, William
Smith, ‘De Witt
Snodgrass, David C.
Stearns, Edith
Steel], John Jay
Steel, Willie
Stevens, Albert B.
Stoddard, Harrie
Stone, George Fred.
Stone, Luella
Tallant, Lucy
Tebbetts, Horace B.
Tebbetts, John E.
Tebbetts, Mollie V.
Tryce, James:
Upson, Grace
Walcott, Earle A.
Walcott, Mabel
Walcott, Maude
Weldon, Jennie
Wright, Sallie
The foundation.

Under the laws of California, in the year 1869, the
COLLEGE OF SANTA BARBARA was incorporated, It
owes its origin to the feeling that, with its health-
giving breezes and almost perfect climate, southern
California is destined to be the Paradise of America,
and that consequently a necessity exists for an edu-
cational institution which shall carry its pupils further
than is the province of the public schools. The citi-
zens of Santa Barbara and vicinity felt that the rap-
idly -increasing population and wealth of their own
county and those adjoining would justify considerable
expense in providing for their children better means
and methods of education, In obedience to this feel-
ing, a number of public - spirited citizens of Santa
Barbara organized a stock company, who erected suit.
able buildings for the immediate wants. The success
attained by their first efforts, and the encouragement
of almost the entire community, induced the incor-
porators to re-organize under the new Code, with a
capital stock of One Hundred Thousand Dollars.

The institution is governed by a Board of eleven
Directors, who have been chosen from among the
most prominent and intelligent citizens of the county.
They serve only in order to promote the educational
214 SANTA BARBARA COLLEGE.

interest of the State, and to open wider fields of learn-
ing for the sons and daughters of the country. Their
best thoughts are given to the Institution.

LOCATION.

Santa Barbara, the seat of the college, lies on the
coast, two hundred and ninety miles south of San
Francisco. Situated to the south of the Santa Inez
mountains, it is sheltered from the coast winds, The
cool and invigorating sea-breeze renders the climate
mild and even. All fruits common to temperate and
semi-tropical climates grow luxuriantly in its vicinity.
Frosts seldom come, and Winter is a word scarcely
found in the language of its people. From January
to January the trees are covered with leaves and the
fields are green with the revolution of crops. The
fevers often found in other localities of the same lati-
tude are never experienced. The climate is very
beneficial in cases of consumption and all pulmonary
diseases. The advantages of its climate are so wide-
ly admitted that people from all parts of the country are
coming to make it their home. To no other locality
can the parent send his child and be so assured that

-in every respect the climate is any nearer perfection.

CHARACTER OF THE INSTITUTION.

Directors and Faculty of Instruction pledge them-
selves to do all in-their power to make the Santa Bar-
bara College absolutely, not relatively, a good institu-
tion ; to requite the trust which the people place in
them with the best possible instruction; and to cul-
tivate among all their pupils true manliness and true
womanliness,
SANTA BARBARA COLLEGE. 215

‘¢Qur plans of education are disposed to include
all that the Past has handed down of good, all that
the Future may offer to us. By the study of Lan-
guage, Philosophy, and History, we inherit the rich
experiences of Humanity; by the study of Natural
Science we search after the Laws of Creation, and
reach out for the Divine.”’

Regular attendance and punctuality at all recitations
and exercises will be demanded. It will be impossi-
ble for any pupil who does not attend to his entire
duty and is not prompt at every exercise to long
remain in the Institution and retain his class rank.
Each recitation is a link ina chain. The loss of one
lesson destroys the unity of all lessons given upon the
same subject. All knowledge afterward obtained is
incomplete. By absence or tardiness, the pupil not
only injures himself, but impedes the entire class
with which he is associated. The others must wait
while the subject is again explained to him. No
pupil will be permitted to thus do himself and others
injustice.

It is our aim not to burdem students with arbitrary
rules and useless restraints. Students will be given
all liberty consistent with their own welfare. The
government is intended to -be liberal but fism in
character. It will be advisory rather than compulso-
ry. We believe that he who teaches one to govern
himself is a better teacher than he who governs a
score by compulsion.

The institution will be entirely free from sectarian
bias. The pure morality and piety of the Scriptures,
excluding everything sectarian and denominational,
is the foundation of all moral and religious teachings. *
216 SANTA BARBARA COLLEGE,

The patrons, stockholders, and directors are members
of every sect and denomination. Justice to them de-
mands the utmost liberality. The Sabbath will be
observed as a day of rest and religious teaching, and
should be made the pleasantest of the week. Attend-
ance upon Divine worship is expected, and parents
are requested to signify the church which they pre-
fer their children shall attend. An instructor will
accompany the younger pupils.

All classes are to be frequently visited by an ex-
amining committee, whose duty it will be to see that
they are making commendable progress, and report to
the Board of Directors. It is requested that parents
having children in the institution, or contemplating
putting children under its charge, visit the class-
rooms, and then consult with the Principal with re-
gard to the progress made or desired.

The College receives pupils of both sexes. It thus
places itself in accord: with the progressive spirit and
the necessities of the West. Girls and boys have each
an equal share in the instruction, and will be treated
alike.

SPECIAL FEATURES.

The points in which Santa Barbara College differs
from most other educational institutions of a similar
general character may be briefly summed as follows :

1. Special attention is given to Physical Culture.
Recognizing the great fundamental fact that a sound
mind cannot exist without a sound body, we have
given much thought to the physical development of
those intrusted to us.

The best gymnasium in the State, the only one con-
nected with a school in California, is now completed
sANTA BARBARA COLLEGE: 217

and fitted up with all the apparatus necessary for prac-
ticing both heavy and light gymnastics. Every pu-
pil will have an opportunity daily to take part in the
exercises. Physiological laws will be our guide in di-
recting them. Parents should encourage their chil-
dren to be earnest in these pursuits; for in this way
alone can the young be given sound bodies to supply
vigor to inquiring minds. Disciplined thus in body,
young men and young women will leave our institu-
tion better fitted to use that knowledge which they
have acquired, both for their own good and for the
good of the community.

2, The Modern Languages will receive special at-
tention. The benefits arising from a study of the
Modern Languages, both in respect to discipline and
practical value, are so many and so well known that
a list of them here is unnecessary. Those who desire
will be offered an opportunity constantly to converse
in French, German, and Spanish.

38. Vocal music will be taught every pupil. In-
strumental music will receive special attention. All
who have thought upon the subject acknowledge the
refining influence which music has upon the individ-
ual. It also affords measukeless comfort and enjoy-
ment to the home circle. We need not assure parents
that this important branch of study will always be
superintended by a teacher of much experience and
culture.

4, Every pupil will be instructed in the rudiments
of Drawing. By no other method is a pupil taught
so well to observe minutely and attentively the phe-
nomena of nature as by a course of instruction in the
art of Drawing. If any one doubts this, let him sit
$18 SANTA BARBARA COLLEGE,

down and attempt to put upon paper the simplest
object within sight. He will be skeptical no longer.
Drawing is but an attempt to reproduce what we see,
and is the test of the accuracy of our observation and
comparison.

 

General Statement,

The Santa Barbara College contains eight depart-
ments, with six grades in each.

Ist. Mathematics.

2d. Natural Sciences.

3d. English.

4th. History and Geography.

5th. Modern Languages.

6th. Ancient Languages.

7th. Drawing and Painting.

8th. Vocal and Instrumental Music.

The classes are: The Elementary, Preparatory,
First Year, Second Year, Junior Year, and Senior
Year,
Bourse of Study.

ELEMENTARY CLASS.
First TERM.

Arithmetic, Robinson’s Rudiments.

Geography, Guyot’s Primary.

English, Swinton’s Language Primer,

Penmanship, Payson, Dunton and Scribner’s No. 3.

Reading, Bancroft’s Fourth Reader. ‘

Drawing, Knudsen’s first year’s instruction in draw-
ing.

Spelling, Swinton’s Word Book to Lesson 106.

Music, Vocal and Instrumental.

French, Oral Exercises.

German, Ahn’s Rudiments of the German Lan-
guage.

Spanish, Oral Exercises.

SECOND TERM.

Arithmetic, Robinson’s Rudiments.

History, Swinton’s First Lessons.

English, Swinton’s Language Primer.

Reading, Bancroft’s Fourth Reader.

Penmanship, No. 4.

Spelling, Swinton’s Word Book to end of first year’s
work, .
220 SANTA BARBARA COLLEGE.

Drawing, Conclusion of first year’s instruction.

Music, Vocal and Instrumental.

French, Ahn’s first Primer.

German, Ahn’s Rudiments continued.

Spanish, Oral Exercises continued ; first lessons in
reading.

Science, Hotze’s First Lessons.

PREPARATORY CLASS.
First TERM.

Arithmetic, Robinson’s Practical and Intellectual.

Geography, Guyot’s Elementary.

English, Swinton’s Language Lessons.

Reading, Bancroft’s Fifth Reader.

Penmanship, No. 5.

Spelling, Swinton’s Word Book, second year’s work
to lesson 106.

Drawing, Second year’s instruction in drawing.

Music, Vocal and Instrumental.

French, Ahn’s first course.

German, Ahn’s Method of learning the German
language to ex. 60.

Spanish, Elements of Grammar.

Science, Youman’s Botany.

SECOND TERM.

Arithmetic, Robinson’s Practical and Intellectual.
History, Higginson’s United States.

English, Swinton’s Language Lessons.
Penmanship, No. 6.

Reading, Bancroft’s Fifth Reader.

Drawing, Conclusion of second year’s instruction.
SANTA BARBARA COLLEGE, 221

Spelling, Swinton’s Word Book to end of second
year’s work.

Music, Vocal and Instrumental.

French, Ahn’s first course concluded ; colloquial ex-
ercises.

German, Ahn’s Method continued.

Spanish, Spelling ; colloquial exercises,

Science, Morse’s Zoolggy.

FIRST YEAR.
FIRsT TERM.

Arithmetic, Robinson’s Practical and Intellectual.
Geography, Guyot’s Intermediate.

English, Swinton’s Progressive Grammar.
Penmanship, No. 7.

Spelling, Swinton’s Word Analysis, begun.
Drawing, Third year’s instruction in drawing.
Music, Vocal and Instrumental.

French, Ahn’s second course; verbs.

Spanish, Ahn’s Grammar.

German, Otto’s Grammar.

Science, Physiology.

SECOND TERM.

Arithmetic, Robinson’s Practical and Intellectual,
completed.

History, History of England.

English, Swinton’s School Composition.

Penmanship, No. 8.

Spelling, Swinton’s Word Analysis, completed.

Drawing, Conclusion of Third year’s instruction,

Music, Vocal and Instrumental,

W
222 SANTA BARBARA COLLEGE.

French, Ahn’s Second Course concluded ; Hachet-
te’s First Reader ; irregular verbs.

German, Otto’s Grammar ; exercises in composition.

Spanish, Ahn’s Grammar, continued; irregular
verbs; First Reader of Mantilla.

Science, Introduction to Geology (Dana).

SECOND YEAR.

First TERM.

Mathematics, Robinson’s Higher Arithmetic, and
Elementary Algebra,

Geography, Guyot’s Common School.

English Composition and Rhetoric, Word Analysis.

Penmanship, No. 9.

Drawing, Crayon drawing.

Spelling, McElligott’s Manual.

Music, Vocal and Instrumental.

French, Fasquelle’s Grammar; First Reader con-
cluded.

German, Exercises in writing German ; translation.

Spanish, De Torno’s combined Grammar; Second
Reader of Mantilla; elements of composition.

Science, Gray’s Botany.

Latin, Harkness’ Latin Grammar and Reader.

Greek, Goodwin’s Greek Grammar and Leighton’s
Reader.

SECOND TERM.

Mathematics, Robinson’s Higher Arithmetic and
Elementary Algebra, completed.

History, Swinton’s Outlines.

English, Composition and Rhetoric, Word Analysis,

Penmanship, No, 10,
SANTA BARBARA COLLEGE, 223

Drawing, Crayon drawing concluded.

Spelling, McElligott’s Manual.

Music, Vocal and Instrumental.

French, Fasquelle’s Grammar continued; Elements
of Composition; Reading of Guillaume Tell (Lamar-
tine). :

German, Petermann’s First Lesebuch.

Spanish, De Torno’s Grammar continued ; Roemer’s
Reader ; Conversation.

Science, Chemistry.

Latin, Harkness’ Introduction to Latin Composi-
tion; Casar’s Commentaries, books I. and II.

Greek, Jones’s or Arnold’s Exercises ; Xenophon’s
Anabasis begun.

JUNIOR YEAR.

First TERM.

Mathematics, Robinson’s University Algebra to
Equations; Davies’ Geometry, books I., II. and II.

History, Guizot’s History of Civilization.

English, Underwood’s British Authors.

Music, Vocal and Instrumental.

Spelling, Study of Words.

French, Composition; Grammar continued; Lalle-
magne (Mad. de Stael).

German, Whitney’s Grammar and Exercises.

Spanish, Ollendorf’s Grammar; Introduction to
Spanish classics.

Science, Quackenboss’ Natural Philosophy.

Latin, Cseear’s Commentaries, books IIT. and IV.;
Cicero’s Orations against Cataline.

Greek, Boise’s First Greek Lessons; Anabasis.
224 SANTA BARBARA COLLEGE.

SECOND TERM.

Mathematics, Robinson’s University Algebra to Se-
ries. Davies’ Geometry, books IV., V. and VI.

History, Hopkins’ American Ideas.

English, Underwood’s American Authors.

Music, Vocal and Instrumental.

Spelling, Study of Words.

French, Correspondence ; Conyersation ; Jntroduc-
tion to Classics.

German, Goethe’s Hermann and Dorothea.

Spanish, Correspondence ; Conversations ; Classics.

‘Science, Mineralogy, lectures.

Latin, Cicero de Amicitia; Atneid.

Greek, First three books of the Anabasis completed.
Smith’s History of Greece.

SENIOR YEAR.
First TERM.

Mathematics, Davies’ Geometry, and Robinson’s
University Algebra completed.

History, Ancient History.

English, Elements of Criticism.

Music, Vocal and Instrumental.

Spelling, Words and their Uses, by Richard Grant
Whits.

French, Grammaire complete de Poitevin ; Compo-
sition ; French Classics.

German, Lessing.

Spanish, Gramatica de la Academia ; Conversation;
Composition.

Science, Guyot’s Physical Geography. ;

Latin, First Six Books of the Aneid completed,

Greek, Homer’s Iliad, three books ; Prosody,
SANTA BARBARA COLLEGE. 225

SECOND TERM.

Mathematics, Davies’ Trigonometry and Mensura-
tion.

History, Lord’s Modern History.

English, Elements of Criticism.

Music, Vocal and Instrumental.

French, Grammaire de Poite vin, concluded ; Mod-
ern Literature ; Conversation ; Philology of the French
language.

German, Goethe’s Faust.

Spanish, Modern Literature of Spain and South
America compared.

Science, Burritt’s Geography of the Heavens.

Latin, Odes of Horace.

Greek, Iliad continued.

OPTIONAL STUDIES.

Book-keeping, Single and Double Entry.

Instrumental Music, Piano and Violin-

Special Singing Lessons,

Painting and Special Drawing.

The grade of each pupil is determined at the time
of admission, by a careful examination in his or her
previous studies; and at the close of each subsequent
term the pupil is advanced to the next higher grade,
provided that on examination he or she is found quali-
fied.

The lack of thoroughness in the elementary branches
on the part of the older pupils who enter the college—
indeed, the almost total neglect of training in these
important steps of education, makes it necessary for
us to advise those who are looking forward to placing

*11
226 BANTA BARBARA COLLEGE,

their children under the care of this institution to
see that this elementary work be carefully looked
after, so that when these same children enter they
may be able to grade with pupils who have come up
through the different classes of this school.

To accommodate those who may wish to have their
children’s education begin in this school, we have
established, in connection with it, a KINDERGARTEN
on the most improved plan.
SANTA BARBARA COLLEGE. 227

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School opens at 8:45 a. M., fifteen minutes being
occupied in the morning exercises. The school-day
is divided into seven recitation periods, with five-
minute recess between each recitation. Drawing
will alternate with writing, and reading with vocal
music. In the table, Sr. stands for Senior Class; J,
Junior Class; S, Second Year Class; F, First Year
Class; P, Preparatory Class; E, Elementary Class;
and B, for Book-keeping.
Miscellaneous.

ixpenses,

Day PUPILS.
Kindergarten, course, board, lights, washing,
and tuition in all studies (excepting those un-
der the head of extra charges), per term of

FiVE MONS ies ccsccssavessdeaen cigars dervEn dene ruaTees $140
Elementary COULSC,.........ccccsecdeecceceseeccecacceees 150
Preparatory course, with first, second, junior

ANG. SCNIOL YORTS..i55s.00 scsanaas sosecesdersesernaewaces 175

Where two children occupy the same sleeping-
room a deduction per term of $12.50 each will be
made.

EXTRA CHARGES.

Piano or Violin Lessons, each......... 5 00 per month.
Special Singing Lessons............... 5 00 « «
Painting and Special Drawing...... 5 00 « “
Book-keeping...............0005 nuieul dates 200 « 66

When more than one modern lIan-
guage is taken, an extra charge
will be made of,.............0000: veeee 5 00 6 “

Books and stationery for the use of pupis are fur-
nished free of charge. They must, however, be kept in
perfect order, and be returned to the school. All ABUSED
articles will be charged. Books should be covered.
‘

SANTA BARBARA COLLEGE. 229

Pupils, in addition to their ordinary wearing appa-
ret and toilet articles, will be require dto furnish nothing
but a pair of heavy colored blankets. ach article of
apparel must be marked with the pupil’s name in full ;
otherwise the laundry cannot be responsible.

CALENDER YEAR—1876-77.

Begins, <cccr sa sekawnuudigeesie nd ne ceniens »- August Ist, 1876.
PAO Se sdicteeseii GLa gies 9 43.h:dd Goan Magadan May 24th, 1877.
VACATION.

BegiN8 3 i vicdansnanoreaeaeraue ed Assy December 15th, 1876.
DS sie sit wise ioe bed dss 0 av ga ww Be nie's Cane January 8th, 1877.

GENERAL REMARKS.

Pupils will not be received in the Boarding Depart-
ment unless they can furnish satisfactory evidence of
good moral character, and give sufficient security for
the prompt payment of their bills.

Any donations to the cabinets or library will be
gladly received.

All possible care will be taken of pupils who may
become sick. Parents may rest assured they will be
early informed of any illness on the part of their chil-
dren.

A variety of good and wholesome food will be put
upon the table, and every means adopted to remove
the common prejudice against the board supplied by
educational institutions.

Simplicity in dress is suggested. No uniform has
been deemed advisable, but, in order better to per-
form the various exercises in gymnastics, A LOOSE
ATTIRE IS ESSENTIAL.

All bills payable at the end of every four weeks.
230 SANTA. BARBARA COLLEGE.

Pupils are requested to make no presents to teach-
ers. It is hard to accept, still harder to refuse.

Pupils guilty of habitual disorder, insubordination,
or immorality, will be sent before the Board of Di-
rectors.

The only acceptable excuse for absence or tardiness
is sickness or unavoidable prevention.

REGULATIONS FOR BOARDING PUPILS.

Rising bell......... at 7 o’clock Dinner.......... at 12:30 P. M.
Breakfast......... ....a6 7:45 Supper..........0., at 6 P. M.
Retiing bells. cae cc ante ceewswe vba sarees ee ae bee oe at 9 P. M.

Each pupil, on entering the college, obtains a copy
of the Rules to be observed, and a Time-table show-
ing how he or she is employed every hour daily-

Yo the Yeachers.

First. You should be well qualified. You should
have the knowledge of the science, which you can
acquire by close application only, under an able teach-
er, for a considerable length of time.

Second. Secure the confidence and respect of your
class by thorough teaching and a gentlemanly de-
portment on ail occasions.

Third. Strive to have your class make the degree
of advancement which will reeommend you to to the
public as an able teacher.

Fourth. Stand or sit before your class, place your
eyes upon the whole, and give special attention to
him who is the process of analysis.

Fifth. Give each member of the class the amount
of time for the examination of his subject which his
peculiar structure of mind may require.
SANTA BARBARA COPRLEGE. 231

Sixth. Never drill your class unless you have the
page in which you are exercising them.

Seventh. Allow no time to elapse between the
pupil’s error and your correction.

. Eighth. Do not interrupt the process of analysis
with a long explanation. Say wrong, sir, or wrong.
Utter these words the very moment in which he com-
mits the error.

Ninth. You should speak with propriety. You
should set an example which your pupils may safely
follow.

Tenth. Do not play with your knife, with your
ruler, with your walking-stick, with your book, with
your pencil, with your watch-chain, with your fingers,
etc., etc., while you are teaching. No man of sound
mind will ever waste his time in the practice of these
dandy tricks.

Eleventh. You should not permit your pupils to
indulge in any of the above crazy feats. Pupils are
much disposed to be shaking their feet, thumping the
books and tables with their fingers, twisting and turn-
ing their persons; these are pranks which modest
persons will never play off upon themselves or others.
All buffoonery, debasing jests, scurrility, and low
mirth are entirely destructive to anything like prog-
ress; and all who indulge in them, whether young
or old, rich or poor, should be cut off from the class
at once.

Twelfth. You-should not permit one pupil to teach
another while you are giving instructions, Each
member should listen to the teacher.

Thirteenth. Devote all your spare hours to the study
of valuable’ books ; acquire all the information which
232 SANTA“BARBARA COLLEGE,

your health and opportunities will permit. The more
knowledge you have the better you can teach. Never
slight the poor, nor flatter the rich; view all as the
children of one Father. Do all the good you éan, and
prevent all the harm in your power.

Fourteenth. The teachers will be held responsible
for the books, pens, pencils, rubbers, rulers, and ink-
wells belonging to the several departments over which
they preside; also for the defacing of desks, walls, or
black-boards.

Yo The Students.

“< On. Study. Sit down to your studies every day
under the deep impression that what you have to do
demands your best powers and your utmost diligence.
Strive to acquire the habit of close and fixed atten-
tion in study. He who has ‘not learned the art of
fastening his mind on the subject, and of holding that
subject strictly and firmly before it, will never look
deeply into anything ; will never accomplish anything
which deserves the name of investigation.

Constantly implore the aid of the Holy Spirit in
study. The duty of humbly and importunately ask-
ing the blessed Spirit’s influence to sanctify our affec-
tions, and to aid us in cultivating all the graces and
virtues of the Christian life, will not, I suppose, be
disputed by any one who has the smallest tincture of
piety. Never imagine that any valuable amount of
knowledge, and especially of accurate knowledge, is
to be obtained without labor. Leave nothing till you
have done it well. Skimming over the surface of
any subject is of little use. Passing on to something
SANTA BARBARA COLLEGE. 233

else before that which precedes is half understood is
really oftentimes worse than useless. Bring your ac-
quaintance with any subject to the test of writing.
It is wonderful how far the crudeness and inadequacy
of a man’s knowledge, on a given subject, may be
hidden from his own mind, until he attempts to ex-
press what he knows on paper. He then finds him-
self at a loss at every step, and cannot proceed with-
out much extension, and no less correction of his
former attainments. Carefully maintain order in
study. He who does not study upon a_ plan will
never pursue his studies to much advantage. Bea
close student through life.

A good scholar. Itis found to be a great deal easi-
er to become a good svholar than an indifferent one.
He who studies everything thoroughly, to which he
turns his attention, doubles his power at almost every
step. All men, whether they understaud the phi-
losophy of language or not, judge, and generally very
correctly, of the improvements of any man’s mind
by the ease with which they understand what he
proposes to communicate. There can be no accurate
thinking, and of course no correct reasoning, without
a precise and correct use of words.

Rules,

1. Every pupil must conform in all respects to the
regulations of the College.

2. Pupils late, and those returning after absence,
must, before joining their classes, present a written
excuse, signed by parent or guardian.

8. When the College-bell rings, every pupil is at

12
234 SANTA BARBARA COLLEGE.

once to go to his class-room, and take his place quiet-
ly and orderly, having all necessary books, pencils,
etc., etc.

4. When the lesson is finished, every pupil is to
leave the class-room quietly and orderly ; and all
shouting, pushing, running, and boisterous behaviour
about class-room doors at the hours of meeting, chang-
ing, or dismissal of classes, are strictly prohibited.

5. No playing or jumping over forms or desks is
allowed in any class-room at any time.

6. When dismissed, each boy or girl is at once to
proceed to the play-ground, or go home. Loitering
in or about class-rooms is strictly prohibited.

7, All school-books must be covered and kept as
clean as possible ; and no writing on or destroying
books will be permitted. —

8. No school-books are to be left lying about any
of the class-rooms or College premises,

9. No pupil is permitted to destroy or injure pens,
desks, maps, windows, or any College property what-
ever ; all such damages to be repaired at the expense
of the defaulter.

10. No pupil is permitted to cut or write upon the
desks, offices, walls, boards, fences, or other College
furniture or property.

11. Throwing stones or other missiles within the
College grounds, or in the roads or streets adjoining,
is strictly prohibited.

12. When a pupil accidentally or otherwise breaks
a window, or injures College property, he must im-
mediately report it to the officer on duty.

18. No waste paper is to be thrown about class-
rooms, premises, or play-ground, but into ‘the
waste-paper box.”’
SANTA BARBARA COLLEGE. 285

14, Every pupil must carefully prepare all lessons
prescribed ; and no excuse will be sustained for non-
preparation, except a written one from a parent or
guardian.

15. Quiet, order, decorum, and gentlemanly con-
duct must be strictly observed at all times.

16. Every pupil must be respectful and obedient to
masters. Any marks of disrespect or impertinence
in word or manner will be summarily punished.

17. The use of all improper language is strictly pro-
hibited ; and any pupil who persists in it, after hav-
ing been warned, will be expelled from the College.

Rules for Boarding-pupils,

1. The use of tobacco POSITIVELY FORBIDDEN,
Under no circumstances will a boy be allowed to use
tobacco in any form.

2. Boys will be allowed to ramble on the hills on
Saturdays, also to take early morning walks; but no
boy, young or old, will be allowed to go down town
unless accompanied by a teacher.

3. Not more than two boys will occupy the same
sleeping-room, and no visiting in each other’s rooms
will be permitted unless by special permission from
a teacher and for a special purpose. No jumping on
beds or romping of any kind is allowed in bed-rooms.

4, Boys who rise early, and before the rising-bell,
must wear slippers so as not to disturb the household
or those who desire rest.

5. Boysare required to keep their rooms in perfect
order and appear at the table with hair and clothes
brushed, boots blacked and nails cleaned, and must
bathe every week.
236 SANTA BARBARA COLLEGE.

6. Girls will not be allowed to go outside the Col-
lege grounds unless accompanied with a teacher.
Pupils will be encouraged to walk out every day at
four, when the day’s exercises are over. A teacher
will always be in readiness to go with them.

7. Girls will be expected to make their own beds,
and to keep their rooms in perfect order.

8. No pupil, either doy or girl, will be allowed to
visit friends of their parents, unless under the super-
vision of a teacher, as they might make acquaintances
whose company may retard the progress in their stud-
ies.

9. Pupils who do not receive instruction in instru-
mental music will not be allowed to use the pianos.
Those receiving instruction will have a fixed time
for practice,-and no disturtance by the presence of
other pupils during the practice periods will be per-
mitted.. It has been found that indifferent thumping
for mere pastime is detrimental to progress. All
pianos will be closed when not required for schedule
use.

10. Pupils will not be permitted to attend theatres,
entertainments, or places of amusement of any kind,
neither to go out in the evenings. On Sunday eve-
nings, from 7 to 8, instruction will be given in Bible
History. ,

11. Perfect silence must prevail in the buildings
after 9:15 P. M.
SANTA BARBARA COLLEGE. 237

To Parents.

The Rules and Regulations have been inserted that
parents may know just what is expected of their chil-
dren.

The college curriculum is laid down on a plan that
will not overwork pupils ; but in order to maintain a
good standing in any grade it will require application,
industry, and study. Idle boys, indifferent to their
recitations, will not be tolerated, but excused from
the school. Irregular attendance or absence, unless
caused by sickness, cannot be permitted. The object
of the school is to make students, to teach children
how to apply themselves, that they may become
scholars, and that their conduct may be unexception-
al. Too many are of the opinion that school work
tends to weaken the constitution of children ; the ef-
fect is quite to the contrary ; at least nine out of every
ten whose parents are able to give a good education
at private schools, will be benefited by strict school
discipline. We do not mean overwork—but work.
It refines the mind and strengthens the body. Noth-
ing is so dangerous as idleness, and parents who do
not wish their children to study or to come under the
Rules and Regulations had better not send them.

Lectures.

A course of ten lectures will be delivered in the
College Hall upon various subjects during the Fall
and Winter. Proceeds for the benefit of the College
Library. (Free to the pupils. )
ERRATA.

ead Rete

Page 6, fourteenth line from top, Prof. Lowe, in-
stead of Lovoe.

Page 44, fifth line from the bottom, we have sate
instead of we sold have.

Page 224, ninth line from bottom, White, instead
of Whits.

Page 228, under the head of ‘« Expenses,” Day
Pupils should read Boarding Pupils.

The following description of five varieties of Euca-
lyptus-trees should have been inserted on folio 88 :

Eucalyptus goniocalyx, F. v. Mueller.—From Cape
Otway to the southern parts of New South Wales. A
large tree, which should be included among those for
new plantations. Its wood resembles, in many re-
spects, thatof E. globulus. For house-building, fence-
rails, and similar purposes, it is extensively employed
in those forest districts where it is abundant, and has
proved itself a valuable timber.

Eucalyptus hemiphloia, F. v. Mueller.— New South
Wales and South Queensland. To be regarded as a
timber - tree of great excellence, on the authority of
the Rev. Dr. Woolls. It is famous for the hardness
and toughness of its timber, which is used for shafts,
spokes, plow-beams, and similar utensils.

Eucalyptus Leucoxylon, F. v. Mueller.—The ordi-
nary iron- bark tree of Victoria and some parts of
South Australia and New South Wales. As the sup-
ply of its very durable timber is falling short, and as
it is for some purposes superior to that of almost any
other Eucalypt, the regular culture of this tree over
wide areas should be fostered, especially as it can be
raised on stony ridges not readily available for ordi-
nary husbandry. The wood is sometimes pale, or in
other localities rather dark. The tree is generally
restricted to the lower Silurian sandstone and slate
formation, with iron-stone and quartz. It is rich in
Kino. E. sideroxylon is a synonym.

Eucalyptus maculata, Hooker. — A spotted Gum-
tree of New South Wales and South Queensland. A
lofty tree, the wood of which is employed in ship-—
building, wheelwrights’ and coopers’ work. The
heart-wood as strong as that of British Oak (Rev. Dr.
Woolls).

Eucalyptus obliqua, L’ Heritier.* — The ordinary
stringy-bark tree, attaining gigantic dimensions. The
most extensively - distributed and most gregarious of
all Eucalypts, from Spencer’s Gulf to the southern
parts of New South Wales, and in several varieties
designated by splitters and other wood - workers by
different names; most extensively used for cheap
fencing - rails, palings, shingles, and any other rough
wood-work, not to be sunk under ground nor requir-
ing great strength or elasticity. The bulk of wood
obtained from this tree in very poor soil is perhaps
larger than that of any other kind, and thus this spe-
cies can be included even here, where it is naturally
common and easily redisseminated, among the trees
for new forest plantations in barren, woodless tracts
of our own country, to yield readily and early a sup-
ply of cheap and easily fissile wood.