The Bushman — Life in a New CountryLandor, Edward Wilson
History
The Bushman — Life in a New Country
Landor, Edward Wilson
Western Australia -- Description and travel
"On the 25th we proceeded on our journey. I observed two new species
of acacia near Yeinart. We mistook our road, and made our old
station at Badgee-badgee, where we stopped to dine and feed our
horses. I also found some curious aquatic plants in the pools of
water among the rocks at Badgee-badgee. After dinner we succeeded
with difficulty in tracing our road to our present station on the
Mouran pool, the cart tracks being nearly obliterated by the
trampling of the sheep. On arriving, we found that the exploring
party had returned, and that Captain Scully and my son James had
left, on their return, about half an hour before our arrival. The
mutilated specimens of plants brought home by the party, and the
accounts of some which were left behind, determined me to visit the
new river myself, after botanizing a day in the vicinity of the
station, where I found a fine glaucus-leaved Anadenia, and Mr.
Gilbert got specimens of the blue kangaroo, and several small new
quadrupeds -- one of them apparently a true rat, almost as large and
mischievous as the Norway rat. Having got two natives, one of whom
(Cabbinger) had been with the party to the north, we started on the
27th, and slept at a spring called Boorbarna. On the way I found a
species of the common poison which I had not seen before, and a
beautiful Conospermum, with pannicles of blue flowers varying to
white. I was informed, by my son Johnston, that a plant like
horehound, but with scarlet flowers, in tubes about an inch long,
grew on the top of a stony hill to the north of the spring; I went
and found the plant, which belongs to Scrophularinae; I also found
a Manglesia, allied to Tridentifera, but having the leaves more
divided; I also found a beautiful blue climbing plant, a species of
Pronaya, on the top of the same hill. On the 28th, soon after
setting out on our journey, I found two splendid species of
everlasting flower, of which my son Johnston had been the original
discoverer; one, with golden-yellow flowers varying to white, has the
flowers in heads different from anything of the sort I have seen
before, and will, I think, form a new genus of Compositae; and the
other with pink flowers, growing two feet high, something like
Lawrencella rosea, or Rhodanthe Manglesii, but if possible finer
than either. In nine or ten miles to the north of Boorbarna, we
crossed a curious tract of country, covered with what I considered a
variety of quartz, which breaks with a conchoidal fracture, but it
has very much the appearance of flint; in many places the pieces were
large, with sharp angles; my sons complained that it injured their
horses' feet, but by alighting, and leading our horses over the worse
parts, I did not perceive any bad effects from it. This tract of
country produces some interesting plants; a splendid Calathamnus,
with leaves nine inches long, and showy scarlet flowers, was found by
my youngest son, and I got plenty of specimens.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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