Aboriginal Australians -- Government relations; Dunk Island (Qld.); Natural history -- Australia -- Queensland
Another small tree, suggesting in its regular and well-balanced shape
the use of the pruning-knife, is GUETTARDIA SPECIOSA, the flowers of
which are white with a tinge of pink in the centre and highly fragrant.
The fruit is a hard, woody drupe, containing small seeds. TIMONIUS
RUMPHII, belonging to the same Family, but of more frequent occurrence,
bears small white flowers and globular fruit. The white, finely grained
wood is said to resemble English sycamore. Though harsh and flaky, the
surface of the bark seems to retain moisture, making it attractive to
several species of fungi and epiphytal ferns, the most conspicuous of
the latter being the stag's-horn. Few of the trees near the beach are
free from such encumbrances.
To unaccustomed eyes the Pandanus palm is chief among the noticeable
features of the flora of the coast of tropical Queensland. Two species
are represented on these accommodating sands, each suffering no ill,
from imbibing salt water, each exhibiting the peculiarity whence the
genus derives its common name--the screw palm, the arrangement of the
long, narrow, prickle-edged leaves displaying in the most regular
and demonstrative style the perfect spiral. The single stem of youth
frequently deteriorates and occasionally disappears altogether,
adventitious roots, descending from various heights, forming an
elaborate and sure and ever-developing support. The huge, bright
orange-tinted fruit of the species known as Odoratissimus is highly
attractive in appearance, and to the uninitiated offers pleasing hopes
and delicious expectations. It is, however, delusive, being constituted
of woody drupes in close clusters collected into a globular head,
with meagre yellow pulp at the base of each group, the pulp having an
aromatic and unsatisfactory flavour. Each drupe contains an oblong oval
kernel, pleasant to the taste, but so trivial in size as to be hardly
worth the trouble of extraction unless there is little else to occupy
attention save the pangs of hunger. These defects do not detract from
the parade of the tree--picturesque, singular, and replete with interest
to the observer of the infinite variety of the vegetation of the
tropics.
The cockatoo apple (CAREYA AUSTRALIS), which has several useful
qualities, flourishes exceedingly. The ripe fruit, green and insipid,
was wont to be eaten by the blacks, bark from the branches was twisted
into fishing-lines, that of the roots used for poisoning fish, while
the leaves, heated over the fire until the oil exuded, were applied to
bruised and aching parts of the body. Extraordinary tenacity of life
distinguished the tree, the axe, fire, and poison failing under some
circumstances to vanquish it.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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