THE AFGHAN AMEER.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXIII, Issue 10099, 7 April 1896, Page 5

THE AFGHAN AMEER.

Press Association.—Electric Telegraph.—Copyright.

Calcutta, April 6. The Ameer of Afghanistan is arranging for the transport of twelve thousand Kaffirs to the Kafiristan-Russian frontier, where he proposes to erect strong forts.

The Salvation Army have raised at the Albert-street Barracks £10 10s, which will bo sent to headquarters for tho Brunnerton relief fund. A number of the minor? were Salvationists, and in meiuoriam services have been held by the Army in various places in tho South as a mark of respoct- to their deceased brethren.

"There is nothing," Bays the Echo, " that astonishes fcho etrangor visiting Australia for the first time so much as the variety and beauty of its flowers." Australia is, indeed, a land of floral loveliness, and nowhere has Nature been more lavish in hor gifts of bud and blossom than in New South Wales, where, at almost every point, the landscape is an endless panorama of surpassing beauty. There is a plethora of colour in the flowers that everywhere meets the gaze. "They are not placed horo and there only, to give ono the impression of limit j they cover mountains and valleys in all kinds of form and shades of beauty. Climbers, rich in crimson, and interspersed with every other colour, are multiplied by millions, and scattered with a prodigal hand that knows no stint nor bound, save that of infinitude itself, until every shrub and plant, and bush, robed in splondour, makes the country gay with blue and gold, and many coloured dyes." The gorgeous colouring of the Australian floral Kingdom is hardly to bo excelled elsewhere. Among the favourite nativo flowers is the stately waratah, or native tulip, f>s it is sometimes incorrectly designated. It grows to the height of four or five foot, the slender stem being surmounted by a large dahliashaped flower of tho deepost crimson. 11 is sometimes grown as a garden flower, but thrives bost in tho bush. Tho nativo rose, which has no rosetablance, save in its delieato pink tint, to the favourito garden flower, is exceedingly plentiful. The blossom is small and modest, but wonderfully onduring, and forms a charming addition to ail Australian bouquet. Tho rock lily, of which a beautiful specimen, embedded in ice, was lately sont to the Queen, is so callod from its being most abundant in rocky country, where its masses of yellowishwhite blossoms stand out in picturesque relief from tho dense background of darkgreon foliage. The gigantic lily is, perhaps, tho most magnificent of Australian nativo flowors. From a cluster of grace-fully-bonding loaves rises a stalk to a height of from 10 to 15 feet, crowded with about a dozen crimson flowers forming a kind of natural bouquet, .about a foot in diameter. Tho magnolia grandifloru is found in parts of the mountain regions, its large white flowers and delicious fragranco rivalling those of the cultured plant. Tho wild lobelia is sometimes found us abundant as buttercups in an English moadow, but its prosenca is much disliked by pastoralists, as cattle will not eat it. The red flowers of the trumpet jasmine are very beautiful, as are also tho pale yellow flowers of tho wild honeysuckle, while tho rich masses of Golden \V battle • bloom are among the, loveliest attractions of an Australian landscapo, The Christinas Bush is, perhaps, the most popular of all Australian flowers; it takes the place of English holly as a Christmas decoration, tho flowors being small and of a reddish tint. Large quantities of the flowers nresold in Sydney at Christmas timo. There are many other flowers no less beautiful, such as the flannel flowerand nativefuchsia, but the foregoing will suffice to illustrate the rare and unsurpassed beauty of the floral wealth which has made Australia a botanical paradise.