AVENUE IN THE BOTANICAL GARDENS.
"During our stay at Sydney we saw most of the parks named in the foregoing paragraph, and can testify to their beauty and the appreciation in which they are held by the inhabitants. The Domain and the Botanical Gardens were especially attractive; their sites are beautiful, and the Botanical Gardens contain every plant known in Australia, together with exotics from nearly every country in the world. For a student of botany these Gardens would furnish opportunities for months or years of study.
"In the Botanical Gardens our attention was called to three Norfolk pines that are said to have been planted here nearly seventy years ago; one of them is ninety-five feet high, and its circumference, three feet above the ground, is within a few inches of five yards. The other two of the cluster are taller than this one, but not so large in girth. Then they showed us a she-oak tree, which is said to give forth, when the air is perfectly still, a sound like the murmur of a sea-shell. Another curious growth is the Australian musk-tree, which constantly gives out an odor which is perceptible several yards away. Trees and plants from tropical and semi-arctic regions grow here side by side; the Canada fir almost touching the Indian bamboo, and the Siberian larch mingling its branches with those of the palm and the banyan.
"In the evening and on the following day, Mr. Manson introduced us to all the officials of prominence, and to many of the leading citizens. It was a severe brain-tax to remember all their names, but we shall try to do honor to our country in this particular. We have been invited to so many houses that if we should stay here a month we could not exhaust the list, and probably by the time the end was reached a new list would be formed. The Australians are certainly a hospitable people, and the stranger has a 'lovely time' among them."
At their first opportunity Frank and Fred informed themselves about the early history of the colony. Among other curious things Fred made the following note:
"It seems that the people of the United States are indirectly responsible for the settlement of Australia by convicts. Here is a paragraph from page 18 of 'The Official History of New South Wales,' by Thomas Richards, Government Printer, and Registrar of Copyright.
