Austral English Part 283

"I expressed my thirst and want of water. Looking as if they understood me, they [the aboriginals] hastened to resume their work, and I discovered that they dug up the roots for the sake of drinking the sap ... They first cut these roots into billets, and then stripped off the bark or rind, which they sometimes chew, after which, holding up the billet, and applying one end to the mouth, they let the juice drop into it."

Wattle, n. The name is given to very many of the various species of Acacia (q.v.), of which there are about 300 in Australia, besides those in Tasmania and New Zealand. There is no English tree of that name, but the English word, which is common, signifies "a twig, a flexible rod, usually a hurdle; ... the original sense is something twined or woven together; hence it came to mean a hurdle, woven with twigs; Anglo-Saxon, watel, a hurdle." (Skeat.) In England the supple twigs of the osier-willow are used for making such hurdles. The early colonists found the long pliant boughs and shoots of the indigenous Acacias a ready subst.i.tute for the purpose, and they used them for constructing the part.i.tions and outer-walls of the early houses, by forming a "wattling" and daubing it with plaster or clay. (See Wattle-and-dab.) The trees thus received the name of Wattle-trees, quickly contracted to Wattle. Owing to its beautiful, golden, sweet-scented cl.u.s.ters of flowers, the Wattle is the favourite tree of the Australian poets and painters. The bark is very rich in tannin. (See Wattle-bark.) The tree was formerly called Mimosa (q.v.). The following list of vernacular names of the various Wattles is compiled from Maiden's `Useful Native Plants'; it will be seen that the same vernacular name is sometimes applied to several different species--

Black Wattle-- Acacia binervata, De C., of Illawarra and South.

A. decurrens, Willd., older colonists of New South Wales.

A. cunninghamii, Hook.

A. nervifolia, Cunn.

Broad-leaved W.-- A. pycnantha, Benth.

Broom W.-- A. calamifolia, Sweet.

Feathery W.-- A. decurrens, Willd.

Golden W. (q.v.)-- A. pycnantha, Benth.; in Victoria, South Australia, and Tasmania. It is also called Green Wattle, and also, for the sake of distinction between some other tan-bark wattles, the Broad-leaved Wattle.

A. longifolia, Willd.; in New South Wales and Queensland.

Green W.-- A. decurrens, Willd., older colonists New South Wales.

A. pycnantha, Benth.

A. discolor, Willd.; so called in Tasmania, and called also there River Wattle.

Hickory W.-- A. aulacocarpa, Cunn.

p.r.i.c.kly W.-- A. sentis, F. v. M.

A. juniperina, Willd.

Silver W.-- A. dealbata, Link. Silver Wattle, owing to the whiteness of the trunk, and the silvery or ashy hue of its young foliage.

A. decurrens, Willd.

A. melanoxylon, R. Br. (Blackwood).

A. podalyriafolia, Cunn.; called Silver Wattle, as it has foliage of a more or less grey, mealy, or silvery appearance.

Weeping W.-- A. saligna, Wendl.

1827. P. Cunningham, `Two Years in New South Wales,' vol. i.

p. 201:

"The acacias are the common wattles of this country, their bark affording excellent tan, as well as an extract to export to England; while from their trunks and branches clear transparent beads of the purest Arabian gum are seen suspended in the dry spring weather, which our young currency bantlings eagerly search after and regale themselves with."

1827. Vigors and Horsfield, `Transactions of Linnaean Society,' vol. xv. p. 328:

"One of my specimens ... I shot in a green wattle-tree close to Government House."

1832. J. Bischoff, `Van Diemen's Land,' c. ii. p. 23:

"The black and silver Wattle (the Mimosa), are trees used in housework and furniture."

1834. Ross, `Van Diemen's Land Annual,' p. 134:

"Leptospermum lanigerum, h.o.a.ry tea-tree, Acacia decurrens, and black wattle; Corraea alba, Cape Barren tea. The leaves of these have been used as subst.i.tutes for tea in the colonies."

1846. J. L. Stokes, `Discoveries in Australia,' vol. ii.

c. iv. p. 132:

"Black wattle ... indication of good soil ... produce gum."

1850. J. B. Clutterbuck, `Port Phillip in 1849.' p. 32:

"Few, indeed, of the native Australian flowers emit any perfume except the golden and silver wattle (the Mimosae tribe): these charm the senses, and fully realize the description we read of in the `Arabian Nights' Entertainments' of those exotics, the balmy perfume of which is exhaled far and near."

1860. G. Bennett, `Gatherings of a Naturalist,' p. 337:

"These trees were termed `Wattles,' from being used, in the early days of the colony, for forming a network or wattling of the supple twigs for the reception of the plaster in the part.i.tions of the houses."

1862. W. Archer, `Products of Tasmania,' p. 40:

"Silver Wattle (Acacia dealbata, Lindl.), so called from the whiteness of the trunk and the silvery green of the foliage."

1862. G. T. Lloyd, `Twenty-three Years in Tasmania and Victoria,' p. 33:

"The mimosa, or wattle, ... ushers in the Spring with its countless acres of charming and luxuriant yellow and highly scented blossom ... The tanning properties of its bark are nearly equal in value to those of the English oak."

1867. A. G. Middleton, `Earnest,' p. 132:

"The maidens were with golden wattles crowned."

1877. F. V. Mueller, `Botanic Teachings,' p. 24:

"The generic name [Acacia] is so familiarly known, that the appellation `Wattle' might well be dispensed with. Indeed the name Acacia is in full use in works on travels and in many popular writings for the numerous Australian species."

1883. F. M. Bailey, `Synopsis of Queensland Flora,' p. 837:

"Called `Silver Wattle.' The bark, which is used for tanning, is said to give a light colour to leather; value, L3 10s. per ton."

1885. H. Finch-Hatton, `Advance Australia,' p. 43:

"A dense clump of wattles, a sort of mimosa--tall, feathery, graceful trees, with leaves like a willow and sweet-scented yellow flowers."

1889. J. H. Maiden, `Useful Native Plants,' p. 349:

"The ordinary name for species of the genus Acacia in the colonies is `Wattle.' The name is an old English one, and signifies the interlacing of boughs together to form a kind of wicker-work. The aboriginals used them in the construction of their abodes, and the early colonists used to split the stems of slender species into laths for `wattling' the walls of their rude habitations."

1890. Tasma, `In her Earliest Youth,' p. 122:

"It pleased him yearly to see the fluffy yellow b.a.l.l.s bedeck his favourite trees. One would have said in the morning that a shower of golden shot had bespangled them in the night-time.

Late in the autumn, too, an adventurous wattle would sometimes put forth some semi-gilded sprays--but spa.r.s.ely, as if under protest."

1896. J. B. O`Hara, `Songs of the South' (Second Series), p. 22:

"Yet the spring shed blossoms around the ruin, The pale pink hues of the wild briar rose, The wild rose wasted by winds that blew in The wattle bloom that the sun-G.o.d knows."