The last three years had also made great additions to the buildings of William Town; but Melbourne had so increased that we hardly knew it again.  Wharfs and stores fronted the banks of the Yarra-yarra; whilst further down, tanners and soap-boilers had established themselves on either side, where, formerly, had been tea-tree thickets, from which the cheerful pipe of the bell-bird greeted the visitor.  Very different, however, were now the sights, and sounds, and smells, that assailed our senses; the picturesque wilderness had given place to the unromantic realities of industry; and the reign of business had superseded that of poetry and romance.

MANNA.

Near Melbourne I again noticed the manna mentioned above, but had no opportunity of making further observations upon it.  Mr. Bynoe, however, having since visited Australia, has turned his attention to the subject, and the result of his experience, which will be found below, tends to overthrow the opinion I have previously expressed, to the effect, that this substance is the exudation of a tree, not the deposit of an insect.*

(Footnote.  There is a prevailing opinion in some parts of New Holland, particularly on the east side, that the gumtrees distil a peculiar form of manna, which drops at certain seasons of the year.  I have heard it from many of the inhabitants, who, on a close investigation, could only say, that it was to be found adhering to the old and young bark of the trees, as well as strewed on the ground beneath.

In the month of December, about the warmest period of the year, during my rambles through the forest in search of insects, I met with this manna in the above-mentioned state, but could never find in any part of the bark a fissure or break whence such a substance could flow.  Wherever it appeared, moreover, the red-eyed cicadae were in abundance.  I was inclined to think that the puncture produced by these suctorial insects into the tender shoots for juice, would in all probability give an exit for such a substance; but by wounding the tender branches with a sharp-pointed knife, I could never obtain a saccharine fluid or substance.  It was the season when the cicadae were abundantly collected together for reproduction; and on warm, clear, still days, they clung to the more umbrageous parts, particularly to trees that, having been deprived of old limbs, shot forth vigorous stems, thickly clustered with leaves.  To one of these, in which the male insects were making an intolerable noise, I directed my steps, and quietly sheltered myself from a hot wind that was crossing the harbour, bringing with it a dense column of smoke, which for a short time shut out the powerful rays of the sun.  I found that the ground about the root of the tree was thinly covered with the sugar-like substance, and in a few minutes I felt that a fluid was dropping, which soon congealed on my clothes into a white substance.  On rising cautiously to ascertain