Austral English Part 4

The word has disappeared with the need for it.

1837. Jas. Mudie, `Felonry of New South Wales,' p. vii.:

"The ludicrous and affected philanthropy of the present Governor of the Colony, in advertising runaway convicts under the soft and gentle name of absentees, is really unaccountable, unless we suppose it possible that his Excellency as a native of Ireland, and as having a well-grounded Hibernian antipathy to his absentee countrymen, uses the term as one expressive both of the criminality of the absentee and of his own abhorrence of the crime."

Acacia, n. and adj. a genus of shrubs or trees, N.O. Leguminosae. The Australian species often form thickets or scrubs, and are much used for hedges. The species are very numerous, and are called provincially by various names, e.g. "Wattle," "Mulga," "Giddea," and "Sally,"

an Anglicized form of the aboriginal name Sallee (q.v.).

The tree peculiar to Tasmania, Acacia riceana, Hensl., (i>N.O. Leguminosae, is there called the Drooping Acacia.

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

p. 202:

"We possess above a hundred and thirty species of the acacia."

1839. Dr. J. Shotsky, quoted in `Sydney Morning Herald,' Aug. 5, p. 5, col. 2:

"Yet, Australian sky and nature awaits and merits real artists to portray it. Its gigantic gum and acacia trees, 40 ft. in girth, some of them covered with a most smooth bark, externally as white as chalk. .. ."

1844. L. Leichhardt, Letter in `Cooksland,' by J. D. Lang, p. 91:

"Rosewood Acacia, the wood of which has a very agreeable violet scent like the Myal Acacia (A. pendula) in Liverpool Plains."

1846. C. P. Hodgson, `Reminiscences of Australia,' p. 149:

"The Acacias are innumerable, all yielding a famous bark for tanning, and a clean and excellent gum."

1869. Mrs. Meredith, `A Tasmanian Memory,' p. 8:

"Acacias fringed with gold."

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

"The name Acacia, derived from the Greek, and indicative of a th.o.r.n.y plant, was already bestowed by the ancient naturalist and physician Dioscorides on a Gum-Arabic yielding North-African Acacia not dissimilar to some Australian species.

This generic name 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 ... Few of any genera of plants contain more species than Acacia, and in Australia it is the richest of all; about 300 species, as occurring in our continent, have been clearly defined."

Acrobates, n. the scientific name of the Australian genus of Pigmy Flying-Phalangers, or, as they are locally called, Opossum-Mice. See Opossum-Mouse, Flying-Mouse, Flying-Phalanger, and Phalanger. The genus was founded by Desmarest in 1817.

(Grk. 'akrobataes, walking on tiptoe.)

AEpyprymnus, n. the scientific name of the genus of the Rufous Kangaroo-Rat. It is the tallest and largest of the Kangaroo-Rats (q.v.). (Grk. 'aipus, high, and prumnon, the hinder part.)

Ailuroedus, n. scientific name for the genus of Australian birds called Cat-birds (q.v.). From Grk. 'ailouros, a cat, and 'eidos, species.

Ake, n. originally Akeake, Maori name for either of two small trees, (1) Dodonaea viscosa, Linn., in New Zealand; (2) Olearia traversii, F. v. M., in the Chatham Islands. Ake is originally a Maori adv. meaning "onwards, in time." Archdeacon Williams, in his `Dictionary of New Zealand Language,' says Ake, Ake, Ake, means " for ever and ever." (Edition 182.)

1820. `Grammar and Vocabulary of Language of New Zealand' (Church Missionary Society), p.133:

"Akeake, paulo post futurum"

1835. W. Yale, `Some Account of New Zealand,' p. 47:

"Aki, called the Lignum vitae of New Zealand."

1851. Mrs. Wilson, `New Zealand,' p. 43:

"The ake and towai ... are almost equal, in point of colour, to rosewood."

1883. J. Hector, `Handbook to New Zealand,' p. 131:

"Ake, a small tree, 6 to 12 feet high. Wood very hard, variegated, black and white; used for Maori clubs; abundant in dry woods and forests."

Alarm-bird, n. a bird-name no longer used in Australia. There is an African Alarm-bird.

1848. J. Gould, `Birds of Australia,' vol. vi. pl. 9:

"Lobivanellus lobatus (Lath.), Wattled Pewit, Alarm Bird of the Colonists."

Alectryon, n. a New Zealand tree and flower, Alectryon excelsum, De C., Maori name t.i.toki (q.v.); called also the New Zealand Oak, from the resemblance of its leaves to those of an oak. Named by botanists from Grk. 'alektruown, a c.o.c.k.

1872. A. Domett, `Ranolf,' I. 7, p. 16:

"The early season could not yet Have ripened the alectryon's beads of jet, Each on its scarlet strawberry set."

Alexandra Palm, n. a Queensland tree, Ptychosperma alexandrae, F. v. M. A beautifully marked wood much used for making walking sticks. It grows 70 or 80 feet high.

Alluvial, n. the common term in Australia and New Zealand for gold-bearing alluvial soil. The word is also used adjectivally as in England.

1889. Rolf Boldrewood, `Robbery under Arms,' p. 403:

"The whole of the alluvial will be taken up, and the Terrible Hollow will re-echo with the sound of pick and shovel."

Ambrite (generally called ambrit), n.

Mineral [from amber + ite, mineral formative, `O.E.D.'], a fossil resin found in ma.s.ses amidst lignite coals in various parts of New Zealand. Some identify it with the resin of Dammara australis, generally called Kauri gum (q.v.).

1867. F. von Hochstetter, `New Zealand,' p. 79:

"Although originating probably from a coniferous tree related to the Kauri pine, it nevertheless has been erroneously taken for Kauri gum."--[Footnote]: "It is sufficiently characterised to deserve a special name ; but it comes so near to real amber that it deserves the name of Ambrite."

[This is the earliest use of the word.]

Anabranch, n. a branch of a river which leaves it and enters it again. The word is not Australian, though it is generally so reckoned. It is not given in the `Century,'

nor in the `Imperial,' nor in `Webster,' nor in the `Standard.'

The `O.E.D.' treats Ana as an independent word, rightly explaining it as anastomosing, but its quotation from the `Athenaeum' (1871), on which it relies,is a misprint. For the origin and coinage of the word, see quotation 1834. See the aboriginal name Billabong.

1834. Col.Jackson, `Journal of Royal Geographical Society,' p. 79:

"Such branches of a river as after separation re-unite, I would term anastomosing-branches; or, if a word might be coined, ana-branches, and the islands they form, branch-islands. Thus, if we would say, `the river in this part of its course divides into several ana-branches,' we should immediately understand the subsequent re-union of the branches to the main trunk."

Col. Jackson was for a while Secretary and Editor of the Society's Journal. In Feb. 1847 he resigned that position, and in the journal of that year there is the following amusing ignorance of his proposed word--