"Such branches of a river as after separation re-unite, I would term <i>anastomosing-branches</i>; or, if a word might be coined, <i>ana-branches</i>, and the islands they form, <i>branch-islands</i>. Thus, if we would say, `the river in this part of its course divides into several <i>ana-branches</i>,' we should immediately understand the subsequent re-union of the branches to the main trunk."
Col. Jackson was for a while Secretary and Editor of the Society's Journal. In Feb. 1847 he resigned that position, and in the journal of that year there is the following amusing ignorance of his proposed word—
1847. `Condensed Account of Sturt's Exploration in the Interior of Australia—Journal of the Royal Geographical Society,' p. 87:
"Captain Sturt proposed sending in advance to ascertain the state of the Ana branch of the Darling, discovered by Mr. Eyre on a recent expedition to the North."
No fewer than six times on two pages is the word <i>anabranch</i> printed as two separate words, and as if <i>Ana</i> were a proper name. In the Index volume it appears "Ana, a branch of the Darling."
1847. L. Leichhardt, `Overland Expedition,' p. 35:
"The river itself divided into anabranches which . . . made the whole valley a maze of channels."
1865. W. Howitt, `Discovery in Australia,' vol. i. p. 298:
"What the Major calls, after the learned nomenclature of Colonel Jackson, in the `Journal of the Geographical Society,' anabranches, but which the natives call billibongs, channels coming out of a stream and returning into it again."
1871. `The Athenaeum,' May 27, p. 660 (' O.E.D.'):