Journal of an Overland Expedition in Australia : from Moreton Bay to Port Essington, a distance of upwards of 3000 miles, during the years 1844-1845 by Ludwig Leichhardt
page 52 of 431 (12%)
page 52 of 431 (12%)
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branches; most of us were several times severely stung by them. When
found near our encampment we generally destroyed them, by quickly raising a large fire with dry grass. A species of Gristes was abundant in the water-holes, but it was of small size: the eels have disappeared. Nov. 25.--We travelled about eight miles, north by west, ascending a spur, from which the waters flowed, both to the south-west and to the eastward, but both collecting in Robinson's Creek. Every time we turned to the westward we came on tremendous gullies, with almost perpendicular walls, whereas the easterly waters formed shallow valleys of a gently sloping character. The range was openly timbered with white-gum, spotted-gum, Ironbark, rusty-gum, and the cypress-pine near the gullies; and with a little dioecious tree belonging to the Euphorbiaceae, which I first met with at the Severn River, and which was known amongst us under the name of the "Severn Tree:" it had a yellow or red three-capsular fruit, with a thin fleshy pericarp, of an exceedingly bitter taste; the capsules were one-seeded. The gullies were full of bush-trees, amongst which the Bottle-tree, and the Corypha-palm were frequent. Pomaderris and Flindersia were in fruit and blossom. According to Mr. Gilbert, rock wallabies were very numerous. On a RECONNOISSANCE I traversed the continuation of the range, which I found to be of a flat, sandy, and rotten character, having, with the exception of the Blackbutt, all the trees and other characteristics of the sandstone country of Moreton Bay: Xylomelum, Xanthorrhaea, Zamia, Leptospermum, a new species of forest oak, which deserves the name of Casuarina VILLOSA, for its bark looks quite villous; Persoonia falcata, R. Br., a small tree about fifteen feet high, with stiff glaucous falcate leaves, and racemose inflorescence; a dwarf Persoonia, with linear leaves, the stringy-bark, and a species of |
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