low the specimens
collected by himself in that part of New Holland, to supply the chasm
which would otherwise have existed in the series. Part of the west and
north-western coast, examined by Captain King, having been previously
visited by the French voyagers, under Captain Baudin, I was desirous of
obtaining such information as could be derived from the specimens
collected during that expedition, and now remaining at Paris; although I
was aware that the premature death of the principal mineralogist, and
other unfavourable circumstances, had probably diminished their value:*
But the collection from New Holland, at the school of Mines, with a list
of which I have been favoured through the kindness of Mr. Brochant de
Villiers, relates principally to Van Diemen's Land; and that of the
Jardin du Roi, which Mr. Constant Prevost has obliged me with an account
of, does not afford the information I had hoped for. I have availed
myself of the notices relating to Physical Geography and Geology, which
are dispersed through the published accounts of Captain Flinders',** and
Baudin's Voyages;*** and these, with the collections above alluded to,
form, I believe, the only sources of information at present existing in
Europe, respecting the geological structure and productions of the north
and western coasts of Australia.

(*Footnote. M. Depuch, the mineralogist, died during the progress of the
voyage, in 1803; and, unfortunately, none of his manuscripts were
preserved. M. Peron, the zoologist, after publishing, in 1807, the first
volume of the account of the expedition, died in 1810, before the
appearance of the second volume. Voyage etc. 1 page 417, 418; and 2 page
163.)

(**Footnote. A Voyage to Terra Australis, etc., in the years 1801, 1802,
and 1803, by Matthew Flinders, Commander of the Investigator. Two volumes
quarto with an atlas folio; London 1814.)

(***Footnote. Voyage de Decouverte aux Terres Australes etc. Tome 1
redige par M. F. Peron, naturaliste de l'Expedition, Paris 1807. Tome 2
redige par M. Peron et M. L. Freycinet 1816. A third volume of this work,
under the title of Navigation et Geographie, was published by Capt.
Freycinet in 1815. It contains a brief and clear account of the
proceedings of the expedition; and affords some particulars connected
with the physical geography of the places described, which are not to be
found in the other volumes.)

In order to avoid the interruption which would be occasioned by