Page:Extracts from the letters and journals of George Fletcher Moore.djvu/211

 Rh answers pretty well, if carefully applied. Mr. Brown has an outside covering of it, about fourteen inches in thickness, over a shingled roof, to keep out heat, but it is expensive. You inquire, "of what quality is my land on the Swan?" This is a very general and comprehensive question.—I forget how many thousand varieties of earth old Evelyn reckons: I will not say there are so many varieties on my land, yet it varies considerably. I can give you a section of it. On the alluvial land, the grass-wattle and the gum-trees flourish; on another portion, the herbage is of inferior quality, and the trees are consequently of a dwarfish and shrubby nature: one of these looks and smells like white-thorn, and has a white flower, but not of the same shape—I believe it to be of the Mespilus species. It is called here, generally, by the English appellative, the May-thorn. The third division has a shrubby covering, and produces the red-gum, white-gum, broom, wattle, and grass trees.

I have acquired some knowledge of the indications of soil: mahogany is indicative of sandy land; red gum, of stiff cold clay; wattle, of moisture; and the broom and dwarf grass tree, of what we term shrubby herbage.

The next question you ask is about "water."—