On the natural order of plants called Proteaceae

Brown had been botanist during Matthew Flinders' circumnavigation of Australia, and since returning in England in 1805 he had been preparing descriptions of the specimens collected during the voyage.

It then discusses the biogeography of Proteaceae, noting the southern hemisphere (that is, Gondwanan) distribution of the family, and that "[t]he most numerous genera are also the most widely diffused."

This is still considered the fundamental division in the family, though opinion has varied on whether the defining character should be fruit dehiscence or paired flowers.

Although not explicitly attributed, it was widely believed, and is still so, that this revision was contributed by Richard Salisbury, who had been present at all four of the meetings at which Brown read his paper.

The revision contains many of the plant names that Brown had presented to the Linnean Society; for example, the genera Petrophile, Isopogon and Grevillea.

Salisbury is also accused of having appropriated some of Brown's observations; for example, in the Linnean Society copy of Knight's paper, where Salisbury says that he suspects that the fruit of Persoonia is unusual, Brown has pencilled in "He suspects it because he listened very attentively to my paper when read at the Linnean Society."

For example, Samuel Goodenough wrote "How shocked was I to see Salisbury's surreptitious anticipation of Brown's paper on new Holland plants, under the name and disguise of Mr. Hibbert's gardener!

It seems not inconceivable, therefore, that Salisbury... would have made amendments to Knight's final manuscript in the light of Brown's remarks... and hurried it through the press to defeat the machinations of his enemy."