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An immense corrugated galvanised iron water-tank stands beside every house, and most of the larger ones have their own windmill for pumping up water.

All the gardens were gay with flowers in this beautiful climate, even at the end of the winter. Masses of purple kennedya,1 a showy climbing plant with a small pealike flower, hung from a high wooden fence surrounding our host’s house. Geraniums grew like shrubs, and a magenta bougainvillea was a curtain of colour.

We arrived in Australia with the wattle; the mimosa sold in London shops can give but little idea of its trees, shining like cloth of gold among the grey eucalyptus, and outlining the streams. It is comparable to our hawthorn, though it is not in the same way a harbinger of spring, for the mild and flowery winters have no terrors. Australians are immensely proud of their wattle. They never lose an opportunity of commenting on its beauty, and just as no two Irishmen can agree on the exact identity of the Irish shamrock among a variety of small trefoils, so wherever you go in Australia a different variety of mimosa is pointed out as the “true” Australian wattle.