To Find Limestone Many Of Our Researches Were Directed.
But after repeated
assays with fire and chemical preparations on all the different sorts of stone
to be picked up, it is still a desideratum.
Nor did my experiments
with a magnet induce me to think that any of the stones I tried contained iron.
I have, however, heard other people report very differently on this head.
The list of esculent vegetables, and wild fruits is too contemptible
to deserve notice, if the 'sweet tea' whose virtues have been already recorded,
and the common orchis root be excepted. That species of palm tree
which produces the mountain cabbage is also found in most of the freshwater
swamps, within six or seven miles of the coast. But is rarely seen
farther inland. Even the banks of the Hawkesbury are unprovided with it.
The inner part of the trunk of this tree was greedily eaten by our hogs,
and formed their principal support. The grass, as has been remarked
in former publications, does not overspread the land in a continued sward,
but arises in small detached tufts, growing every way about three inches apart,
the intermediate space being bare; though the heads of the grass are often
so luxuriant as to hide all deficiency on the surface. The rare
and beautiful flowering shrubs, which abound in every part, deserve
the highest admiration and panegyric.
Of the vegetable productions transplanted from other climes, maize flourishes
beyond any other grain. And as it affords a strong and nutritive article
of food, its propagation will, I think, altogether supersede that
of wheat and barley.
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