Abstract
WE owe an apology to our scientific friends at the Antipodes for having allowed the president's address, delivered last July, to have remained so long unnoticed. Mr. Ellery, after noticing the most important papers that had been read during the past two sessions (for no address was delivered in 1870 in consequence of alterations being made in the Society's buildings), including eight on physical science, seven on geology, mineralogy, and palaeontology, one on natural history, three on medical science, one on social science, and four on arts and manufactures, expresses his regret that the state of their finances has for a time caused a stoppage in the printing of their Transactions which were commenced in 1868. He then proceeds to notice the present state of the chief scientific establishments in Victoria. “Botanical knowledge,” he observes, “is largely indebted to the labours of our member, Dr. Von Müller, the head of the botanical department of Victoria. One of the prominent results of Dr. Müller's investigations is the publication of the Universal Flora of Australia (under the editorship of Mr. Bentham), to which Dr. Müller is the principal contributor; the fifth volume has, by this time, passed the press in London. This work, when completed, will be the only one extant that deals universally with the flora of a large division of the earth's surface. It will form a permanent basis of all future research with respect to the adaptability of Australian plants to medicine, the arts, or other useful purposes. You will be glad to learn that Dr. Müller is about to establish a permanent phytological collection in our new industrial museum, which will comprise objects illustrative of our natural resources in the vegetable kingdom, and of materials used in the industries obtained from plants in this country as well as other parts of the globe. Such a collection properly arranged and accessible to the public will undoubtedly prove a valuable and instructive addition to the industrial museum, more especially if at the same time Dr. Müller fulfils a project he has in contemplation of publishing in a popular form a volume on the culture of utilitarian plants in the colony not indigenous to it, as well as of plants likely to add to the resources of countries lying under similar latitudes to our own. The preservation and perpetuation of our more extensive forests has already become a question of serious import. A few years ago we thought our forests inexhaustible; but already the bad effects of the indiscriminate stripping of our mountain ranges are becoming visible. The immense and increasing draft on our forests for fuel and other purposes has already denuded the land in the vicinity of towns and other centres of population of its former covering of timber. This, unless replaced by artificial planting, will eventually leave our hills bare, and in all probability the climate will suffer in proportion. Dr. Müller, in introducing and rearing very large numbers of forest trees that will be useful in themselves for the wood and bark, has exercised a wise forethought, of which the colony will reap the fruit in years to come, when the corks, oaks, hickories, red cedars, and firs, shall have in part replaced our eucalypti, mimosas, and other far less useful trees.”
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D., G. The Royal Society of Victoria . Nature 3, 496–497 (1871). https://doi.org/10.1038/003496a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/003496a0