quarrelsome Dutchmen sometimes gave one another very awkward wounds with it. Whether the plant had received its name at the Cape, or had carried it there from Holland, I know not, but it appeared to have been brought into Swan River with no other appellation; and the dislike with which the colonists regarded it was not quite without foundation, as the extreme sharpness of its seeds was troublesome in a country where to go barefoot is a common practice. I remember seeing a poor barefooted child, who had but lately come to Barladong, and who had been sent to our house on an errand, standing midway in our field, crying with all her might, and refusing to stir another step forwards "because of the double gees." The rapid and wide diffusion of the plant has been no doubt due to the manner in which the spines of the seeds stick to the fleeces of the sheep, like burrs which they much resemble. We did our best to persuade our neighbours to give the spinach a place on their tables, but, with the exception of a very few persons, the prejudice against it as a troublesome weed was too old and deep to be exploded by our example.
Though neither oranges nor potatoes took kindly to the climate of Barladong its apricots were unrivalled, and the fruit upon our standard trees was far finer than any that we had ever seen produced even by scientific care on garden walls in England. Apricots were less cultivated than they deserved, for the reason, perhaps, that few persons knew much more of the right method of pruning them than one of our friends did, who carefully cut out all the bearing wood, and then wondered that he had no fruit. Standard peach-trees were much in favour,
