Photographs by Robin Smith & text by Bruce Edwards; brown end-papers. The eucalypts possess a unique beauty. It is a beauty which, more than any other feature, gives the Australian landscape its distinctive character. The early settlers, familiar with the well-ordered foliage of English trees, at first found the native gums strange and mis-shapen. Curiosity, however, soon developed into affection. Today the eucalypts are the most popular of Australia's native trees. Much of their appeal comes from their great variety of shape, size and foliage. Both the painter and the poet have looked at the eucalypts and found qualities they admired: majesty, grace, strength, resilience. Robin Smith began photographing the eucalypts twenty years ago. Since that time he has become acknowledged as Australia's leading scenic photographer. This book has been a long-cherished ambition and a labour of love. The trees included in this collection present a wide selection of the eucalypts. Here are the karri, mountain ash and blue gum of the forests, the mallees and coolibah of the inland, the ironbarks and river red gums, the sculptured forms of the snow gums. The text by natural history writer Bruce Edwards provides an informative introduction to the eucalypts and explains their importance in the ecology of the continent.