1868 - Lindsay, W. Contributions to New Zealand Botany - OBSERVATIONS ON GENERA AND SPECIES, p 48-88

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OBSERVATIONS ON GENERA AND SPECIES.

THE following observations consist mainly of field-notes on living plants in their native habitats; or of the results of repeated examination of my Otago Herbarium, since my return home in 1862.

The subject of these observations, for the most part, is the variation of the individual in relation to the species--whether in the wild or cultivated state. But they include, also, details bearing on geographical distribution; economical applications; Maori and settler's nomenclature; and acclimatisation in Britain.

The instances of variation of species would doubtless have been much more numerous and more marked had I had, on the one hand, the same facility of access to large suites of New Zealand plants in public Herbaria--especially Kew 1 --that I had to my own Herbarium; and on the other, of access to living specimens over larger areas, and in a greater diversity of habitats.

I. --Genus ACIPHYLLA.

Until the publication of Dr. Hooker's "Handbook," there existed utter confusion as to the New Zealand species and varieties of this genus. In the "Flora Novae Zelandiae" only one well established species was recognised, viz., A. squarrosa, which included the very different plant now distinguished as A. Colensoi. Two varieties were named angustifolia and latifolia--depending on the different breadth of leaf--a character, however, which is inconstant and confusing. Sir David Munro, of Nelson, recognised at least two species--what is now called after him A. Munroi, Hook. f., in addition to the common A. squarrosa; while the Otago settlers believe that there are at least three common species in the eastern and lowland districts of Otago,--species characterised by different size and colour (respectively greenish and brownish). Characters of such a kind are most fallacious; for in regard to size, it varies greatly in the same species,--the commoner species being sometimes much taller than a man, while they are occasionally scarcely higher than a hand. Elevation above the sea has much to do with this variation as to size,--the smaller forms being generally the most alpine, though it also appears that the commoner species frequently attain their greatest development at considerable elevations only. As regards colour, it varies with age-

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tending to become yellowish or brownish in old plants, while it is of a fresher green in young ones. In the Herbarium, the plant in all its parts--especially, perhaps, the fruit--generally acquires more or less of a yellow, brownish, or olive hue. At least five New Zealand species are now recognised--all of which appear to occur in Otago--the most of them found only, or chiefly, in alpine or sub-alpine districts--ascending occasionally as high as 7,500 feet.

The larger species are familiar to the settler as "Spear-grass," or "Bayonette-grass," "Wild" or "Bloody-Spaniard," in allusion to their very rigid, strong, poniard-like, sharp-pointed leaves, which are disposed around the flowering stem like a chevaux-de-frise, and which readily pierce the clothes or skin of men or animals coming roughly in contact with them. Hence, a "Spear-grass Scrub" on the hill ranges is frequently most formidable, if not impenetrable, to men and horses, though it forms one of the favourite hunting grounds of the Wild Pig, which feasts daintily on the thick, succulent root. In the Matukituki valley, "Bayonette-grass" forms an undergrowth in a dense scrub of prickly thorn, [Discaria Toumatou,] while it is very rare in the forests of the West Coast. It springs up where burned "Scrub" is succeeded by grass, and the latter is, in its turn, fired--on the pasture ranges of the interior, (Sullivan.) The "Spear-grass" must be regarded as one of the peculiarities of the Otago Flora; but like so many of the indigenous herbaceous plants of the Province, notwithstanding its stoutness and hardiness, it is rapidly disappearing before advancing colonisation, and is already all but unknown in the eastern, settled, lowland districts (e.g., in the vicinity of Dunedin.)

The larger species are aromatic in all their parts, and the young flower-stem, when cut across, yields copiously a viscid gum-resin, also aromatic, but tasteless.

Species 1. --A. Colensoi, Hook f., 2 Handb. Fl. N.Z., p. 92. (A. grandis, Colenso; and Hook. f. MSS. in my Herb, and in litt.; apparently corresponding, in part at least, to var. latifolia of A. squarrosa, Fl. N.Z.); the "Taramea" of the Maoris, (Colenso.) North shoulder of Saddlehill, immediately above Renwick's Station,--sparingly, and mostly as isolated individuals; on the road-side up to Greenisland Church; within 6-10 miles of Dunedin, and at elevations under 500 feet above the sea; all, moreover, in flower in December, (W. L. L.) Tapanui and Tuapeka ranges, (Buchanan.)

Pre-eminently the "Nemo me impune lacessit" of Otago, the largest, handsomest, and most formidable of all the New Zealand Aciphyllae. I have examined all the New Zealand forms of A. Colensoi contained in the Kew Herbarium, and have thus had an opportunity of comparing my Otago plant with specimens from Nelson and Canterbury, as well as with all the New Zealand conditions of A. squarrosa. It is evident that the latter and A. Colensoi are widely different plants,--the chief distinguishing features being the refraction of the bracts (middle leaflet) in A. squarrosa, which gives the plant a totally different aspect from

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A. Colensoi. Of A. Colensoi there appear to be several varieties,--but none of them such, in my opinion, as to require separate nomenclature. The chief directions or forms of variation are the following:

In some specimens from Nelson (Bidwill), the whole plant is much broader and shorter than my Otago plant, the foliage less rigid, the leaflets spiny, thick, and grooved. The whole plant, moreover, becomes brown or olive in the Herbarium. In some Canterbury and Nelson forms, the whole plant is only a few inches high, or the leaves only a few inches long. In some of the small states, the plant is even somewhat delicate. The flower-peduncles are 2-2 1/2" long-far exceeding sometimes the bracts in length; while in my plant they are under 1" (inferior in length to the bracts). The spiked inflorescence in my plant is close, (sometimes 14" long,) much narrower, and more spear-like, than in Canterbury and Nelson forms, in which it is very lax,--a difference which cannot be due to the involution of the constituent umbels in drying. Bract in my specimens 1/2 - 3/4" long. Wings of fruit (carpels) very distinct in Canterbury fruited specimens, (my plant was found only in flower.) In age the stylopodium remains sometimes prominent and rigid. In the Herbarium the whole plant sometimes becomes brownish-yellow, and the fruit glossy brown or blackish-brown. The leaf in my plant seems to me abruptly to unequally pinnate,--the pinnae linear-lanceolate, very rigid and cartilaginous, 6-7",--the lower ones 13-14"--long.

The variations, therefore, refer mainly to general height and habit of plant; the length of the leaf, flower-peduncles and bracts; and the laxity or closeness of the inflorescence.

Haast speaks of A. Colensoi as "peculiar to the alpine scenery of New Zealand;" its leaves as very hard and sharp, and often three feet long. It is very abundant in the neighbourhood of the Ashburton Glacier (Canterbury Alps.) "My party," he remarks, "both men and horses, suffered greatly from its punctures, body and limbs being covered with blood when working our way through it." 3 Familiar to the shepherds of Canterbury as "Bloody Spaniard." If it be really the same species, it is interesting to notice its distribution from nearly the sea level, (in the Greenisland district of Otago,) up to the Glacier line, (5,500 feet on the Canterbury Alps.) On the Nelson mountains, Munro states that it does not occur below 2,000 feet.

Species 2. --A. squarrosa, Forst.--(corresponding apparently to variety angustifolia, Fl. N.Z.) The "Papaii" of the North Island Maoris, (Colenso); the "Kuri-kuri" of those of the South Island, (Lyall). On the Great South Hoad, near Fairfield Farm, Saddlehill, December, in flower; inflorescence about 40" long: W. L. L. On the hills between Half-way Bush and the North Taeri,

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(Martin). Rare in the districts around Dunedin, and rapidly disappearing, where-ever settlements have made any progress.

This species appears to occur at lower elevations than the preceding generally does, though there is considerable contrariety of statement on this head,--a contrariety which I attribute partly to the circumstance that the two species in question are usually confounded by the settler. If we may accept the testimony of the Government Surveyors, and the run-holders of the interior, of Otago, the plant is to be regarded as usually sub-alpine,--growing frequently in great luxuriance in the midst of snow on the mountains, and attaining, indeed, its maximum development only at considerable elevations,--in the region known to the settler as that of the "snow-grasses," where the Fagus-forest and scrub disappear, and where snow lies longest during the winter. Munro evidently considers the present species as a plant of much lower levels than A. Colensoi; for while the latter is represented as not appearing in Nelson below 2000 feet, A. squarrosa is said not to occur above it. Moreover, he recognises two forms of the latter, one of which, with a flower stem of eight feet high, is found only below 1000 feet. My Otago plants occurred under 200 feet above the sea level; but it is quite probable the species, like most species of the genus, ascends the mountains to a height of 3000 or 4000 feet in Otago. Munro also describes A. squarrosa as inferior in size to A. Colensoi; but I supect this difference in size is more apparent than real, and is due to the inferior breadth of the leaf, and the long, slender, refracted, appressed, spinous middle bract-leaflets.

I examined all the forms of this species contained in the Kew Herbarium, contrasting them more especially with those of A. Colensoi. The most striking differences relate to the breadth of the leaf and the rigidity of its spinous apex, and more especially to the character of the middle bract-leaflets, which look like a dense mass of spines surrounding the infloresence, broken downwards and backward, and crushed inwards as if by some general and rough pressure applied uniformly on all sides. The bracts are sometimes 5" long, and the lateral leaflets comparatively membranous: the stem leaflets very narrow in proportion to their length.

A most characteristic figure is given in Plate 607-8 of Hookers "Icones Plantarum while dried specimens of the flowering head and stem from Otago are to be found in the Museums of Economic Botany of Kew and Edinburgh. Specimens of the gum or gum-resin exuded by the flowering stem, from Dr. Hector, occur at Kew: it is pale, and, save as regards greater transparency, resembles "Kauri" gum.

The information we possess regarding A. squarossa and A. Colensoi is, I believe, far from being complete or satisfactory. They are still evidently confounded with each other by settlers, and the forms of both require further examination in their living state--at all altitudes at which they occur, and in all stages of growth.

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II. --GEN. VISCUM.

V. Lindsayi, Oliver. 4 (Handb. Fl. N.Z., p. 108.) Parasitic on Coprosma rotundifolia, East Taeri Bush; and on Metrosideros hypericifolia, in the Bush, on the banks of the Water of Leith, near its mouth, Pelichet Bay, Dunedin; November and December in flower, (W. L. L.)

In the former locality it was somewhat abundant; in the latter less so. It affects also Melicope, and probably other shrubs or trees; and I believe, when looked for, it will be found a not uncommon Bush parasite, in the eastern districts at least of Otago. It is as yet the only true representative in Otago of our English V. album, L.; but a smaller species, V. Salicornioides, A. Cunn., a parasite on Leptospermum, Gaultheria, Dracophyllum, and other shrubs or trees, which occurs in other parts of the South Island, is also likely yet to be found in Otago.

V. Lindsayi is one of the "Native Mistletoes" of the settler: an extremely insignificant one, however, when compared with the handsome Otago species of Loranthus, whose showy scarlet flowers alone are sometimes one-and-a-half to two inches long, while those of the Viscum are extremely minute, green, and inconspicuous. The latter shrub grows generally at nearly right angles--divaricatingly-- from the stem or branches of its host, in minute tufts, generally from 1 1/2 to 2" long. It is glabrous, branching, succulent, and of a vivid green colour, which, with its succulence, it loses in drying, assuming a shrivelled appearance, and brownish or blackish hue. Joints of the branches or stem vary from broadly obovate to spathulate or oblong-ovate; breadth about 1/4" generally, but variable; length, 1/4"--1/2"; flat. The plant differs much from V. Salicornioides, which has long filiform or terete, twig-like joints, with generally solitary or non-spiked flowers. Not only in the same forest, but even on the same host, V. Lindsayi exhibits several variations, which, however, I had insufficient opportunity for studying. I would commend to local botanists the study of both the New Zealand species of Viscum, regarding whose variations and relations our knowledge is as yet incomplete.

III. --GEN. CELMISIA.

Quite as beautiful a genus as Olearia, though the general aspect of its species is very different. The leaves are generally more or less covered on the under, if not also on the upper, surface, with a thick, white, woolly or cottony tomentum; and the interior of the leaf is also in large measure made up of a similar cottony matter, which, in at least one species, has been applied by the Maoris or settlers to the manufacture of textile fabrics. The extreme toughness of the leaf and the presence of this cottony material have given rise to the popular

t Vide Plate II. of present Memoir.

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colonial name applied to the more familiar species,--the "Leather" or "Cotton" plant. They are also known partly as the "Native Aster,"--a term applied, however, equally to species of Olearia and Mesembryanthemum.

Several of its species are common on the elevated plains and mountains of the interior--above 2,000 feet,--generally where the nutritious grasses of the lower plains or downs cease to grow, and where snow lies for a great portion of the year, e.g., on the terraces of the Te Anau Lake basin (M'Kerrow); on the mountains of Martin's Bay, above the level of the bush, at or about 3,400 feet (Hector). The prevalence of Celmisiae, --with Asteliae (N. O. Liliaceae), which also possess cottony leaves--on the upland pastures, is a source of danger to sheep, which feed on these plants. The cottony matter of the leaf forms balls or concretions in the stomach, obstructs the passage of food through the intestines, and so, too frequently, proves a cause of fatal disease.

Species 1. --C. Lindsayi, Hook, f, Handb. Fl. N.Z., p. 132. 5 In crevices of the Trap Cliffs, Shaw's Bay, the Nuggets; December, in flower, but sparingly. (W. L. L.) I examined all the specimens (seven) in the Kew Herbarium; all, however, from the same station, and all collected by myself.

The plant has a great resemblance to C. Sinclairii. Hook, f., of the Nelson alps. Whole plant covered by a very viscid exudation. Head sometimes nearly 2" in diameter--as pressed in the Herbarium. Rhizome 1/3" thick; leaves sometimes nearly 3" long; serrations of edges so indistinct as to appear absent; margin sometimes smooth and regular; under side beautifully cottony-silvery; tomentum so close or dense as to resemble a coat of white-lead, becoming yellow or discoloured in drying; cottony character of midrib towards the short sheath not always apparent. In the Herbarium the whole plant (including stem, upper surface of leaf, and florets,) becomes brown, while the pappus acquires a brighter orange tint.

Species 2. --C. longifolia, Cass. (C. gracilenta, Fl. N.Z.) Uplands about Fairfield, Saddlehill; Sand-dunes about mouth of the Kaikorai; November and December, in flower. (W. L. L.)

Bears considerable resemblance to our Filago minima, L. It varies greatly with habitat, especially as regards the size of the leaf and flower-head. In some localities, it is a very small delicate plant; while in others it is 6-8" high. Though generally erect, on the sand-dunes it becomes a trailer. The flowers are dry and papery, silvery-whitish; the stem and leaves downy. The Saddlehill and Chainhill plant has the characters of the type. Longest leaves 4" long, 1/16" broad; linear and grass-like. Scapes generally two, more or less slender. Head generally under 1" in diameter; Involucral scales, with brown or blackish-brown acute apex, and blackish midrib; very cottony on both sides; Pappus red. Littoral forms differ in being glabrous, or nearly so, in all their parts [Involucral scales, scape and

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leaves especially]; and in the more slender filiform scape and shorter leaf. Involucral scales acute or acuminate; blackish throughout; pappus much less red.

IV. --GEN. CREPIS.

C. Novae Zelandiae, Hook, f., Handb. Fl. N.Z., p. 164; (Hieracium fragile, Fl. N.Z.) 6 Tuapeka ranges, sparingly, December, in flower. (W. L. L.)

In the Kew Herbarium there are two forms,--the one larger, 14-15" tall, the other smaller, 1 1/2-2" high-corresponding very much to the ordinary, and marsh or montane, dwarf, forms of Taraxacum Dens Leonis, and its var. palustre. Leaf sub-lyrate or sub-runcinate, as in var. palustre of the Taraxacum just mentioned. Flower-scape or stem, especially in dwarf montane forms, sometimes densely coated with black glandular hairs, resembling, when examined under the lens, the stipes of various species of the Lichen-genus Calicium. Involucral scales lanceolate, with rounded obtuse tips, covered, like the scape, with hairs of similar character. Black hairs of pappus sometimes apparently absent.

V. --GEN. RUBUS.

R. australis, Forst. East Taeri Bush; Greenisland Bush; among scrub (or forming it), Basaltic Gully, Stoneyhill; uplands around Fairfield and Saddlehill; November, young, and in flower, (W. L. L.)

In size and general habit the plant is extremely variable; it occurs as a tall, suberect shrub, as a rambling forest climber, or as a straggling dwarf trailer. In the open, it is frequently a stout, suberect, woody shrub; in which form it has the habit of our common Bramble, (R. fruticosus, L.), whose representative it here is. In open country it also commonly occurs as a trailer over the ground, or a climber over or among other shrubs, forming by itself, or contributing, sometimes largely, with other shrubs, to form, the predominant "scrub" of the country. In the Bush the branches frequently become very long and slender, laying hold tendril-wise of the twigs of trees or bushes, and forming a jungle, which, by virtue of the usually densely prickly character of the leaf or leaf-stalk, is a formidable obstacle and enemy to the woodsman, or the adventurous botanist, whose hands and clothing it lacerates severely. In this condition it forms one of the most familiar and troublesome "Lawyers," or "Supple-Jacks," of the forest. It is known to the settler also as the "Wild Irishman," and to the North Island Maori as the "Tataramoa." 7 At the same time, its large showy flower-panicles, added to its scandent habit, enable it to rival species of Clematis and Parsonsia, and other tree-climbers (in their flowering season at least) as ornaments of the sombre "Bush."

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Among the general variations or prevalent phenomena of growth may be enumerated the following:--Branches may be few or many; laxly or densely arranged; leafy or leafless; stout and woody, or filiform and slender; erect or spreading; simply disposed, or intertwining and entangled. Leaf generally very coriaceous; varies from ovate to a mere midrib; in the macrophylline forms leaflets are glossy, and frequently blackish in Herbarium; margins entire, or variously toothed or sinuate; old leaves frequently more or less deeply fossulate, especially on upper surface; upper surface of young ones in Herbarium sometimes almost black, on which the fulvous puberulence of the veins is generally distinct under the lens. Leaflet-petioles sometimes very long (3"); sometimes so short that the leaflet appears almost sessile. Prickles vary greatly in their number, rigidity, and closeness of aggregation; some forms of the plant are densely spinous, others almost a-spinous; sometimes absent on the main stem and branches, though present generally on the ultimate ramuscles, as well as on the leaf-petioles and midribs. They are sub-terete or sub-compressed; generally recurved; always more or less sharp and rigid-pointed. Their distribution is very irregular; sometimes they occur in pairs, or several are close together; while on other petioles of the same leaf or plant, other prickles are sparsely scattered. Pubescence of calyx, flower-stalks, and terminal divisions of panicle variable as to denseness. While the young shoots are pubescent, the stem and branches of the same plant may be only puberulent, or even glabrous. The Hairs, while always of the same yellowish colour, differ greatly in size, number, and arrangement. Flower-panicles lax or dense; much branched and many flowered, or the reverse; in all my specimens without prickles. Petals dry to a buff colour in Herbarium.

The variations of the leaf are infinite apparently, and indefinable; so that it appears to me unnecessary to maintain separately named forms, depending on characters, which, at least in the native state of the plant, appear to be very inconstant. Dr. Hooker, however, assures us in his "Handbook," (p. 54), that all the three varieties therein named--and which appear to occur in Otago--"keep their characters under cultivation." I find that florists in this country cultivate the seeds of R. cissoides, A. Cunn., as a distinct species; and the same seems to be the case with two other forms of the type, which I can only characterise respectively as major and minor conditions. I have seen all three in cultivation in the Edinburgh Botanic Garden--seedlings, regarded as separate species, and reported by Mr. Macnab as growing true to their supposed specific characters. There they are grown under glass, without heat, and are regarded as only half-hardy. Mr. Macnab does not think they would stand our severe winters in the open. But at Trinity, near Edinburgh, Mr. Gorrie has found the same plant to stand unhurt the three last winters (1864-7) at the base of walls with western and eastern exposures, protected, however, so far by the snow of 1867. In cultivation in Scotland, R. cissoides is said to be much more ornamental than some so-called foliage-

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plants. Its berries are small, globular, juicy, and austere. "In the hands of skilful hybridizers, some curious crosses might be obtained between it and our common 'Bramble'--especially Rubus laciniatus," (Gorrie.)

The chief forms of Rubus australis, which occur in my Herbarium, are the following:--

I. FROM EAST TAERI BUSH.

(A.) In one set of specimens, leaflets are about 5-nate, ovate, glabrous, about 1" long, 3/4" broad, with deeply toothed margin.

(B.) In another set, (apparently approaching var. schmidelioides A. Cunn); leaflets are on the same plant 3-nate or irregularly sub-palmate; generally linear-oblong, or linear-lanceolate, or lanceolate; 3" long, 1/3-3/4" broad, glabrous (as in all other cases never seen pubescent below); margins entire, or deeply and irregularly toothed.

(C.) Another specimen possesses the characters of var. glaber Fl. N.Z., and is so unlike the more usual forms of the plant that it is apt to be altogether overlooked as a Rubus. Its young inflorescence is a long, slender, lax panicle, 3-4" long, few flowered (6-14), resembling a raceme; densely pubescent, with tawny or fulvous hairs. Leaf-stalks, branchlets, and even the more woody branches also more or less puberulent. The plant is nearly destitute of prickles; two or three small ones are to be found, only on close examination, on one of the leaf-stalks; latter frequently 1" long. Leaf 3-mate; leaflets somewhat birch-like, 1 3/4" long, 1 1/4" broad; ovate or ovate-oblong; very coriaceous; silvery-glaucous and shining above; lower surface brown; both surfaces marked by much fine reticulation; both quite glabrous; margin irregularly sinuate-serrate, and much lacerate from insect erosion; teeth generally sharp and rigid-pointed, but variable in form and size; margin of leaflet, and especially of its erosions, generally thickened.

(D) In a fourth specimen, the plant is prickly--the prickles occurring chiefly, as usual, on the leaf-petioles and midribs--as brownish-yellow or whitish, sharp, recurved spines. Leaflets vary from ovate to orbicular, about 3/4" in diameter; length seldom much exceeding the breadth; glabrous on both sides in the old state, while in younger conditions there is generally pubescence or puberulence of the midrib and chief veins; margin more or less deeply and most irregularly toothed; both surfaces exhibit a mass of fine reticulation, which is sometimes best marked on upper, sometimes on the paler under, surface. Young leaves generally dry blackish, especially on their upper surface. Leaflet-petioles 1 1/2"-2" long; very slender; puberulence, as usual, best seen on the young shoots (leaves and petioles); consists of fulvous hairs, more or less closely aggregated, appressed, spreading, or retrorse.

II. FROM GREENISLAND BUSH. --Leaflets 3-nate, stalked, ovate-oblong, 1 1/2-2" long, 1-1 1/4" broad, acuminate and obtuse at apex in same plant; very coriaceous, with a toothed and spinulose margin.

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III. FROM SADDLEHILL. --Branching lax; branches few, straggling, and slender; sparingly leafy; leaflets 3-nate on long naked petioles, (sometimes 3" long); leaflets about 1 1/2" long, 1/3" broad; very coriaceous, sub-lanceolate, with deeply and irregularly-toothed margin.

IV. FROM STONEYHILL. --(var. cissoides, A. Gunn.) Leaf consists only of a midrib--the lamina being entirely absent; or there being a minute sub-foliaceous development at the tip of the extremely slender, filiform, tendril-like midrib, which appears as the leafless prolongation of a linear, sub-terete, twining or trailing branch. In this case, there is little difference in size or other character in or between the branches and midribs; the whole plant has a uniform bare appearance, consisting of an extremely tangled mass of inter-twining, long, filiform, tendrillike twigs--more or less copiously prickle-covered. This is generally by far the most spinulose form, the coating of prickles being sometimes as dense as in our Rosa spinosissima, L.; and its leafless, bare aspect places it along with Carmichaelia, Discaria, and other more or less leafless shrubs of Otago, in the category of those which possess an Australian physiognomy. There is a much greater difference in appearance between this leafless form and what is considered the typical or common form--that which is large-leaved and bramble-like--or between it and certain forms of var. glaber-than between many Book-species of other genera in the New Zealand Flora. But in this case the plant is so abundant, that within a very limited area in the settled districts, passage-forms can be collected, which prove the relationship to be one of condition only, and non-specific. It only requires, I believe, greater trouble and more time in the collection of transition or connecting forms over large areas, to prove equally that not a few presently so called species of other genera stand to each other in the simpler relation of forms of a protean and comprehensive type.

In the New Zealand Exhibition of 1865, there was shown an "Unintoxicating Wine, made from the juice of the 'Wild Bramble' growing in Hawke's Bay." 8 This is probably a mere expressed juice, sweetened or not; and analogous to Toot Wine. 9

VI. --GEN. ACAENA.

Under the name A. Novae Zelandiae, 10 Florists cultivate in this country what appear to be different varieties or species of the genus. 11 One group is red-flowered,

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and is probably referable to A. Sanguisorbae; the other is green-flowered, but appears to me to belong to the same species. I have not, however, had sufficient opportunities of determining the species in these cultivated forms of the New Zealand Acaenae, nor how far the mere colour of the inflorescence is a sufficient specific test. In the first group, the leaflet is orbicular and small; in the second, it is oblong, and much larger than in A. Sanguisorbae; while between these representative types there is every gradation in form and size. The mere size and form of leaflet are, indeed, obviously an insufficient specific character.

The red-flowered microphylline form has been largely cultivated by Florists, and is one of the very few New Zealand plants, which they unanimously regard as hardy. It has proved so during many years experience in various localities about Edinburgh, e.g., Trinity (Gorrie & Stark); Botanic Garden (Macnab); Dean Cemetery (Rae). To British Nurserymen it is also now familiar as a favourite ornamental plant for borders, on account of its growth in dense, dwarf masses, covered in autumn with a profusion of scarlet blossom. Backhouse, of York, advertises it as "quite hardy," and as best "in sandy loam and peat." 12 By some Florists, A. Novae Zelandiae is reckoned one of the most important and beautiful introductions yet made from New Zealand.

The green-flowered macrophylline forms have also proved hardy in cultivation, at Trinity, where Mr. Gorrie has had them in the open air for three years. He has also grown the plant under glass: and here it acquires the character of an ornamental pendent plant. On a greenhouse shelf, its shoots, which are long, rambling, and Potentilla or Fragaria-like, hang down five or six feet. Cultivated specimens from Otago seed sent me by Mr. Gorrie have the following characters: Young shoots (leaf and branches) very silky-villous; older branches sparingly covered with very delicate buff-coloured, or whitish, hairs; leaf 1-1 1/4" long; much less silky than in A. Sanguisorbae; hairs mostly on the midrib, and principal veins, below, and on the young shoots. Leaflets, about five pairs, with a terminal one; 1/4-1/3" long; narrower and more deeply serrate than in A. Sanguisorbae; membranous; frequently covered with a whitish or glaucous bloom above; teeth tipped with silky hairs; lowest leaflets always shorter, much more divided, and with narrower, longer, teeth, than the central ones, which are largest and oblong, but not cuneate at either end. Mr. Anderson-Henry cultivates what appears to be a form of the same plant, under the name A. ovina. 13 His is a tall handsome plant,

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with large oblong leaflets, very different in habit from the dwarf, compact, microphylline A. Novae Zelandiae.

A. Sanguisorbae, Vahl. Uplands about Saddlehill and Stoneyhill; on roadsides and waste places; frequent also in the Bush and among scrub in the Greenisland district; sometimes forming a topping to clay fences, as our "Whin" does in Scotland; October, in flower and fruit, (W. L. L.)

A trailer, with the habit of a Potentilla (e.g. Tormentil), whose representative, along with the British genus Sanguisorba, it may be held in great measure here to be. Its terminal, round fruit-balls are studded over with a series of barbed spines or booklets (prolongations from the calyx-tube), which catch the wool of sheep brushing against them. Hence the plant is only too familiar, as the "Native Burr" to the sheep farmers alike of New Zealand, Australia, and Tasmania. As the plant is frequently very abundant on pastures, it seriously damages the quality of the fleece of sheep. To men's clothes, too, the "Burr" sticks like the involucre of our Arctium Lappa, L., or the fruit of our Galium aparine, L. In gardens and fields, moreover, it is a rapidly-spreading, noxious weed, rivalling many of the immigrant British weeds--such as the clovers, docks, and thistles--as the pest of the agriculturist. To the Otago settler the plant is also known as the "Bidi-bidi," or "Beta-beta;" to the North Island Maori as "Hutiwai," "Piri-piri," 14 (Colenso), or "Piri-kahu," (Colenso).

Like the Leptosperma, in the earlier days of colonisation, the plant was much used, in bush journeys, to yield by infusion a substitute for tea.

The specimens in my Herbarium exhibit the following characters: Villosity of young shoots (leaves and branchlets) sometimes very marked; hairs long, numerous, and closely aggregated; villosity of leaf confined sometimes to midrib and principal veins, but of the lower surface only; more generally whole under side is silky; the hairs white, and varying in length and closeness of appression. Leaf generally about 2" long, or under; glabrous above. Leaflets seldom in more than six pairs, with a terminal one; generally oblong, or slightly obovate; about 1/3" long, and 1/7" broad; sometimes simple, linear, and consisting of a single tooth-like lamina; more frequently digitately pinnatifid--the lower leaflets being divided into 1-2, up to 4-6, digitate or linear teeth; more generally there are about 6 teeth on either side, varying in size and form; usually subulate or irregularly triangular; awned or bristle-pointed. Scapes vary in length, sometimes very short, sometimes longish; pubescent or villose, especially when short and stout. Heads about in diameter; Calyx-bristles about long, not purple in Herbarium; Calyx-tube hispid with greyish, long, coarse hairs.

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VII. --GEN. GEUM.

G. urbanum, L., var. strictum, Ait. (G. Magellanicum, Commerson, Fl. N.Z.,) Banks of the Stream, Wetherstones Flat, Tuapeka, 8-12" high; January, in flower, (W. L. L.) The "Kopata" of the North Island Maoris, (Colenso): a term also applied, however, to Pelargonium clandestinum. The representative of our British forms of G. urbanum; than which, however, it is a much handsomer plant. It has also somewhat the habit of our Bidens.

My Herbarium specimens have the following characters:--Hairiness differs in degree and character in different parts of the same plant. Sometimes there is mere scabridity; and there is every gradation between the hirsute and scabrid conditions. The flower-peduncle is generally the most hirsute part of the plant; sometimes it is copiously covered with fulvous bristly hairs. Midrib and chief nerves, with the edge of the leaf and the leaf-petiole, are sometimes also very distinctly hirsute, though occasionally nearly glabrous. Generally the leaf-surface is sparingly covered with short, fulvous, bristly hairs, like those of the flower-peduncle. Larger leaves generally 4-7" long, 3" broad; petiole of radical leaves sometimes 3" long. Forms of leaf so variable that it is impossible to describe or define them in words. The leaf is variously lyrate, pinnatisect, or palmatisect, or pinnate (partly only), or pinnatifid; sometimes pinnate in lower parts, and pinnatifid in the upper; apex acute; Pinnae, sometimes shortly petiolate, (petiole under long); more frequently sessile; and sometimes adnate by a broad foliaceous or membranous base ; extremely variable in size and form; of unequal size and irregular form on same plant; variously, irregularly, and obscurely obovate, elliptical, obcuneate, flabelliform, lobate, sub-digitately pinnatifid, laciniate, or dissected; sometimes 2 1/2" long and 1 1/4" broad; Margin sinuate, or crenate, or doubly crenate; very frequently eroded by insects; terminal pinna largest; central and basal pinnae generally more or less small and auricular. Midrib and principal nerves generally very prominent. Whole leaf dries to a leathery-brown colour. Stipules much simpler than the leaves; generally pinnatifid, consisting of one long central or terminal, and two auricular basal, lobes, sometimes short and sub-simple, or even entire, or only irregularly notched or lobed-broadly ovate; more generally with an elongated central lobe. Common petiole (rhachis), as well as the petiolules, variously hispid or scabrid; never quite glabrous. Flower across. Calyx-lobes; outer surface and margin frequently very hirsute with hairs of same character as on other parts of the plant; inner surface glabrous or scabrid; petals scarcely longer than calyx. Fruit-stalk sometimes 4" long; head sub-globose, about in diameter. Carpels copiously clothed with bristle-like hairs-here more rigid than on other parts of the plant. Styles long, prominent, straight, numerous, brown, scattered over, or projecting from, the

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fruit-head, giving it somewhat the appearance of that of Acaena Sanguisorbae; lower part of the portion beyond the bend hirsute with hairs of the typical character.

I have carefully compared the Otago form of G. urbanum with British forms, in my Herbarium, of that species, and of G. intermedium, especially from Auchtertool Linn, and Aberdour Woods, Fifeshire. The Otago plant is much more leafy than the British one, and the leaf much more, and more irregularly, divided. The British plant has simpler, shorter leaves, of generally only three leaflets (ternate), or with only a rudimentary additional leaflet, on the rhachis. There is the same character of the styles in Auchtertool specimens of G. intermedium Ehrh.; but they are much longer and more slender in the latter. In the Otago plant the pinnae are generally longer, narrower, and more divided. Aberdour specimens of G. urbanum, from the shade of its woods, are quite as tall as the Otago plant.

VIII. --GEN. GERANIUM.

I am far from satisfied with the present definition of the New Zealand species, as a group, or of any one of them. I believe that careful investigation by local Botanists will result in the reduction of the present number of Book-species; and I think, moreover, it would be quite in accordance with Nature to refer all of them to a single type.

The two-flowered peduncle, for instance, seems to me the only character, in my specimens, distinguishing pilosum and microphyllum, (in neither had I opportunity of examining the seeds.) Villosity is much more marked in microphyllum than pilosum; the awn of the sepals is sometimes absent in the latter; the leaves are much smaller, and less cut in the former.

I have, however, quite as much difficulty in satisfying myself of the validity of the specific distinctions between the British G. molle, L., G. pusillum, L., G. pyrenaicum, L., and G. rotundifolium, L. The characters on which Bentham founds the British species of Geranium are not, I think, constant; and are not, therefore, in themselves, good bases for classification; though in combination they may--according to certain views of species--be held to be sufficiently distinctive. Both in New Zealand and British species the following characters are variable:--

1. The distinction between Annual and Perennial growth; not a few plants being both annual, biennial, and perennial, under different circumstances or conditions.

2. Degree of villosity of different parts of plant; and length, colour, and tenuity of the hairs.

3. One or two flowers on flower-peduncles are not invariable in the same species.

4. Length and stoutness of peduncles and pedicels.

5. Form and degree of division of leaves.

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6. Form of sepals; short or long on same species; angled or not; length, especially in relation to petals.

7. Form and colour of petals; division of tips; size-absolute, and in relation to that of sepals.

Several of the New Zealand Gerania have quite a British physiognomy, and the appearance of being naturalised,--growing luxuriantly about settlements, evidently following cultivation. At least one British species is recorded by Dr. Hooker as indigenous, G. molle, L. But, as in the parallel cases of Sonchus and Taraxacum, I know no means of determining what forms to refer to the native, and what to the naturalised plant; for I do not doubt their occurrence also as introduced.

Species 1. G. microphyllum, Hook. f. (G. Potentilloides, Fl. N.Z.). On roadsides, Greenisland, common; on mud-fences and ditch-sides about Kaikorai mill; on sand-dunes about mouth of the Kaikorai; Woodburn ravine, Saddlehill; Stoneyhill; and more or less abundant on all the Greenisland uplands; October to December, in flower, (W. L. L.)

Several forms occur. Sometimes it grows erect-generally 8-10" high-becoming one of the handsomest of the Otago Gerania. More frequently it forms large, flat, spreading tufts, generally about 6-8", but sometimes 20-24", in diameter; straggling and trailing somewhat like our G. pusillum, G. rotundi folium, or G. columbinum, L., which it here represents. Both the erect and procumbent forms occur dwarfed (e.g., in Woodburn ravine).

All the forms in my Herbarium are procumbent, and some of them microphylline, much branched, and very leafy. Leaf frequently only broad in the smaller forms; sometimes nearly 1" broad in the larger; frequently 3-fid, the segments being, further, irregularly notched, the secondary divisions acute or obtuse. Hairs long and graceful; most copious on the young shoots, leaves, flower-peduncles, and calyces. Were it not for the two-flowered peduncle, I would refer this species with Bentham and Midler to pilosum. I am not, however, satisfied of the sufficiency of this specific character.

The "Handbook" gives the habitat of G. microphyllum as "mountainous or hilly situations but my plant was plentiful a little above the sea-level, (under 100 feet).

Species 2. G. dissectum, L., A. var. Carolinianum, Fl. N.Z.

On roadsides in the Greenisland district - sometimes associated with the preceding. The "Matuakumera" of the North Island Maori:--a term, however, more generally applied to the tuberous edible root. Colenso also assigns the Maori name "Pinakitere;" but it does not clearly appear whether to the type, or to which of its New Zealand forms.

B. var. pilosum, Forst. (G. pilosum, Fl. N.Z.) About Myres, Inch Clutha, on the banks of the Clutha; November, in flower and fruit, (W. L. L.) Has the habit of our G. molle.

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The plant occurs both erect and decumbent. Prostrate, dwarf forms resemble microphyllum; they also resemble our G. pusillum; while the larger ones have more the aspect of our G. molle. Whole plant sometimes comparatively glabrous (Clutha forms), and generally the hairs on the stem are very minute, fine, inconspicuous, and closely appressed, so that to the naked eye the stem appears sub-glabrous. Hairs, however, are generally more or less copious on other parts of the plant, varying greatly in their character. They may be short or long, simple or glandular; appressed, spreading, or retrorse; plentiful, or so few and fine as to appear to the naked eye absent. Sometimes they are very long and silky--e.g., on the sepals (in Clutha forms)--spreading, not retrorse. In one of the Clutha forms also, the carpels are clothed with glandular hairs, which possess a slender, filamentous, whitish stem, crowned by a black globular head, resembling some forms of the stipes in the Lichen-genus Calicium; on these carpels they are plentiful and distinct. They have the same character, to a certain extent, on the sepals and flower-peduncles, on which, however, they are less distinctly visible.

There is great diversity in the form of the leaf--especially in the number and character of its divisions--even in the same plant, and still more in specimens from different localities. Upper leaves are sometimes divided to their base; or they are 3-5-fid, or 3-5-nate; the segments being lanceolate, with entire margins; while a little lower on the plant, the leaf may possess the same number of divisions (3 to 5); but the segments are variously pinnatifid, palmatifid, or pedatifid; and frequently, also, they are narrow or linear, with acute terminations. Only sometimes are the leaves seated on long petioles, (occasionally 4" long,) but sometimes, also, they are sessile; and there is every gradation between the sessile and petiolate conditions. The leaf is variable also as to size. Frequently the leaves clothing the lower or mid portions of the stem are 2" broad.

Bracts and stipules vary in length. Bracts membranous or chaffy, brownish-green, with a comparatively stout and dark-brown midrib; while the lateral or laminar portions are sub-translucent, and very membranous. Stipules usually brown or brownish-yellow, and chaffy-mostly subulate or lanceolate, resembling the bracts of the flower-peduncles. Sepals vary in form; lanceolate to broadly ovate; stout or membranous; mucronate, or awned, or not, (not awned in the Clutha forms); ribbed or not, smoothish or hairy. Petals considerably longer than the sepals--sometimes nearly twice as long; bifid or entire--frequently the former; bluish, but becoming in the Herbarium white, as in Campanula and Wahlenbergia.

Three separately named forms of var. Carolinianum are given in the "Handbook." But they appear to me based on inconstant and ill-marked characters, and therefore unnecessarily, I think, occupy a place in classification. My plant possesses the characters of form glabratum; though it is referred in my Herbarium, by Dr. Hooker, to pilosum. The hairs are much less copious. It seems

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in certain respects intermediate between dissectum and molle, having quite as much title to rank with the latter as with the former.

I have compared suites of specimens of the Otago 'pilosum with the British molle in my Herbarium, and I fail to distinguish the two series of plants by any constant or sufficient characters. The resemblance is greater to molle than to dissectum; the foliage is that of the former, while the awned sepals are generally those of the latter.

IX. --GEN. GAULTHERIA.

Species 1. --G. antipoda, Forst. Uplands and gullies of Saddlehill and Stoneyhill; Chain Hill ranges; top of the ranges between Halfway Bush and the North Taeri; Christie's Bush, Saddlehill; Finegand Bush, Lower Clutha; on slaty Traps, Mount Cooey, Clutha Ferry; October and November, young and in flower, (W. L. L.) The "Koropuku" of the Maori.

Var. e (erecta), Handb. Fl. N.Z. Saddlehill uplands and Chain Hill ranges; December, young and in flower, (W. L. L.)

Var. d (microphylla), Handb. Fl. N.Z. Saddlehill uplands; October, in flower and fruit; abundant, (W. L. L.)

The variations of the plant are so numerous and inconstant, especially as regards its habit of growth (erect or prostrate), and the size and form of the leaf, that it appears to me utterly useless to define or name so-called varieties. In my specimens the chief variations are the following:--

Leaf, especially in prostrate forms, frequently narrowly linear-lanceolate, long, and 1/10 - 1/8" broad; while in erect forms, it becomes obovate or sub-obicular, 3/4" long and 1/2" broad-there being every gradation in form and size between these macrophylline and microphylline conditions. In both conditions, the leaves are all more or less serrate,--the teeth being most distinct in the macrophylline forms.

Flowers vary in size, number, degree of crowding (aggregation), and colour; sometimes they are terminal and single (in prostrate forms). Fruit varies, especially in colour and size.

Branches sometimes quite glabrous, or covered with chaffy, brownish, blackish, or whitish bristles--there being every variation between these conditions. Bristles may be long or short, numerous or few--more or less closely appressed; they may affect only the young or terminal branchlets--the older and lower branches being woody and smooth.

The whole plant, including the flower, assumes a deep brownish or blackish-brown colour in the Herbarium. Bush forms are uniformly more delicate and handsome than those growing on exposed uplands. The Handb. Fl. N.Z. describes its forms as mostly alpine; but all the numerous conditions I found in Otago occur at low elevations, generally about 500 feet, and in all cases under

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1500 feet, above the sea. The plant occupies very much the place of our Vaccinium and Arctostaphylos on the moorlands of Otago, both as to habitat and general aspect. It constitutes, with species of Coprosma, one of the commonest elements of the "scrub" on the ranges of the Greenisland district.

Species 2. --G. rupestris, Br., var. d (Colensoi, Hook. f.). Tuapeka ranges; January, in flower, (W. L. L.) A Tarndale (Nelson) form in my Herbarium differs somewhat from the Otago plant, especially in that it is few-flowered--the lax inflorescence more resembling that of some of my Otago forms of G. antipoda than of G. rupestris. The leaves also are considerably larger and more fulvous.

I doubt whether all the larger, erect, macrophylline forms of G. antipoda can be distinguished by any sufficient characters from certain conditions of G. rupestris; and it seems to me probable that the local Botanist may discover further passage-forms, which will render it desirable to unite these Book-species under one type. The parallel forms in both have a pseudo-racemose inflorescence, frequently very much alike; in both, the branchlets are glabrous; and there are other points of resemblance in detail. G. rupestris seemed to me to be a more montane plant than G. antipoda; but my experience in the eastern districts may not hold good throughout Otago.

In specimens of the typical plant from Tarndale, the ultimate branchlets are sparingly hispid with longish, distinct, blackish or brownish, flexuose, subrigid hairs. Leaf varies from broadly-lanceolate to oblong-lanceolate, sometimes sub-orbicular; 3/4" long and 1/4-1/3" broad; subacute, obtuse, retuse, or notched slightly and irregularly, at apex. Racemes about 1" long, few-flowered (frequently 3-6). Pedicels longer than the bracteoles.

In Tuapeka, var. Colensoioccurs as a low bush. Main or older branches are quite glabrous; young branchlets sometimes sub-pubescent, sometimes setulose with long, distinct, bristly hairs, which also occur occasionally on the young leaf-margins. There is the same variety in the form and size of leaf as in the type--smaller, generally under long and broad, frequently suborbicular. Racemes many-flowered, densely clustered, in masses about 1 1/2" in diameter. The various forms of G. rupestris, as named or described by Br. Hooker, differ as much, especially as regards inflorescence, from each other, as do the species of many other genera. I believe the record of the five varieties given in the Handbook to be unnecessary.

Haast mentions what he regards as a new species from stony localities on the plains westward of the western alps of Nelson; but the other two New Zealand species are given in the Handb. Fl. N.Z. as North Island plants only; and it is quite as probable that some of the very variable and puzzling forms of either G. antipoda or G. rupestris may have misled him, as that the subject of his observations deserves place as a distinct and new species.

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X. --GEN. WAHLENBERGIA.

The equivalent in Otago of our British genus Campanula, than which, however, its species are much less handsome, and, in general, inferior also in size. This is one of the many New Zealand genera, which raise the questions,--

1. What is a species in Nature?

2. In species so-called, which are connected by passage-forms, how or where can the systematist properly draw the line of separation?

3. Is it preferable for science to regard such plants as W. gracilis and saxicola as referable to a single type?

As Book-species, undoubtedly, the extreme forms of these plants differ sufficiently. But there is a continuity of variation between them, which renders it impossible to determine where the one species ends and the other begins.

On the Finegand ranges, Lower Clutha, for instance, I met with a plant growing in dense tufts 6-8" high, with a white flower intermediate in size between that of typical forms of W. gracilis, (flower small and insignificant,) and that of W. saxicola, (flower large and handsome.) This appeared to be one of the puzzling transition or intermediate forms between the two species just named, which I was at a loss to refer to the one species rather than the other. A more comprehensive definition of species or types would obviate or abolish--or remedy at least in far greater measure than at present--such difficulties of the field Botanist.

Species 1. --W. gracilis, A. DC. Basaltic gully, Stoneyhill, 8-10" high; Stoneyhill Bush, 15"; uplands about Stoneyhill and Saddlehill, and in Greenisland generally, 12-15"; ranges about Finegand, Lower Clutha; November to December, in flower, (W. L. L.)

Known to the settlers, in common with the following, which better deserves the name, as "the Blue Bell;" the representative in Otago of the British Campanula rotundifolia, L., certain of whose forms it sometimes resembles. My specimens vary in size from 8 to 24"; the plant is sometimes erect; quite as frequently it is more or less a trailer or procumbent. In the larger forms especially, the branches are few, comparatively leafless or naked, slender and filiform; in the smaller forms, especially those which are procumbent, the stems are simple, and the plant more or less densely tufted. Whole plant glabrous in all my specimens--whether larger or smaller--erect or procumbent forms. Leaves sometimes in the larger forms 2" long and 1/2" broad; spathulate or obovate below, becoming linear above; generally comparatively numerous below, the stem appearing leafy, but so sparse above that it appears almost naked; margin entire or sinuate. Calyx-tube sometimes 1/3-1/2" long in larger forms. Corolla uniformly white in Herbarium. Larger forms somewhat resemble the British C. patula, L.; in all cases the Otago plant is inferior in beauty to any of our British Campanulae. I see no advantage in separately naming such conditions as var. a and b of the Handb. Fl.

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N.Z. It would be better simply to indicate the general directions, or forms, of variation.

Species 2. --W. saxicola, Br. Ranges about Finegand, Lower Clutha, December in flower, (W. L. L.) Ascends to 6,500 feet, e.g., on Mount Egmont, (Buchanan.) The "Native Blue Bell" of the settler. The tufted, stellately-arranged radical leaves--somewhat as in our "Daisy"--are scarcely peculiar to this species, as contrasted with W. gracilis; for in the latter, as already mentioned, the stem is virtually naked, while the lower leaves are tufted and stellately arranged, very much as in W. saxicola.

XI. --GEN. VERONICA.

Hardy, shrubby species are so abundant on the higher ranges of the interior of Otago, at or above 4000 feet, where snow frequently falls or lies, that it has been purposed by local Botanists to designate this sub-alpine region "The Veronica Region." The Otago Veronicas include several very handsome shrubs; which sometimes assume or approach the dimensions of trees (6 feet, or upwards, high, with a stem of 8-10" diameter).

In cultivation, they become very ornamental. One or two are already grown in British gardens; and it is probable that many more might be successfully introduced; for, as a group, they are very hardy, and most of them sub-alpine. Several species occur at elevations above 4000 feet--e.g., V. Buchanani, Hook, f., up to 5000; and V. Hectori, Hook, f., up to 7000 feet. Sub-alpine forms are common ornaments of the Highlands of the Lake district; including V. Traversii, Hook. f.; V. buxifolia, Benth.,; V. lycopodioides, Hook. f.; V. cupressoides, Hook, f.; V. Lyallii Hook. f.; and V. Bidwillii, Hook. (3000 ft.) Not a few are common also in the "scrub" or "bush" of the western fjords--e.g., on Chalky Bay and Preservation Inlet, (Hector). Nevertheless, the results of cultivation-experiments in Scotland are by no means uniform. For instance, at Towerville, Helensburgh, all the Otago Veronicas were killed out by the winter, being found to stand only 1° or 2° of frost. So decided, indeed, was the failure of the experiment considered to be here, that all farther idea of growing Otago plants of any kind in the open during winter was at once given up. On the other hand, the experience of Messrs. Gorrie & Anderson-Henry at Trinity is much more favourable. V. speciosa, R. Cunn., which appears to be a North Island species for the most part, withstands a temperature of about 20°; and numerous hybrids between it and other New Zealand species, raised by Mr. Anderson-Henry, have stood 4° or 5° more than this of frost. One or two were unhurt by, though fully exposd to, the cold of January, 1867--thus resisting a greater degree of cold than either parent, (Gorrie.) V. laevis, Benth., which does not appear to be distributed further south than Nelson, stood four winters at the base of walls, and sustained only slight in-

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jury of its shoot-points from the alternate sunny and frosty weather of spring. V. buxifolia, which is subalpine in Otago, withstood the severe winter of 1860-1 --covered, however, by snow; and another New Zealand species (not named) stood out the two last winters at Shandon on the Gairloch, (Gorrie.) The Veronicas cultivated about Edinburgh are mostly referable to the V. Lindleyana of Paxton and Florists (our salicifolia). The majority of those I saw at Hay Lodge, Trinity, appeared to be forms of V. salicifolia, V, elliptica, and V. laevis.

Some of the New Zealand Veronicas were the subject of successful hybridization by Mr. Anderson-Henry--e.g. V. speciosa and V. elliptica. In some of his experiments, seeds were obtained "perhaps in larger abundance and of equal fertility with those of either of its parents." 15

Veronica is one of the many New Zealand genera, which exhibit numerous and puzzling passage-forms between book-species; one of those, therefore, requiring careful revision in order to the establishment of more comprehensive types and specific definitions, and the consequent reduction of specific names. The variations of New Zealand species in cultivation are such that I see no difficulty in referring all the New Zealand forms to a few types; though I cannot go quite so far as my friend Dr. Muller, who, in his Flora of the Chatham Islands, reduces all the Veronicas to a single species.

Monstrosities of the Racemes occasionally occur in the native species-e.g., in the common V. salicifolia. The Maori names "Kokomuka" and "Korokio" probably refer to such common species as become weeds in native cultivations.

Species 1. --V. salicifolia, Forst. Glen Martin and M'Coll's gully, Saddlehill; December, in flower, (W. L. L.) Larger and smaller forms occur. The commonest and most familiar, if not also the handsomest, of all the Otago Veronicas I saw. In allusion to its frequent habit and habitat--on the banks of streams--it is locally known as the New Zealand "Willow," (Buchanan.) The Otago settlers also call it "Korimuka," (Martin,)--"Korumeek," (Hector,)--properly spelled "Koromiko"--a term also applied to V. parviflora, Vahl, 16 (Bidwill), V. elliptica, and perhaps in general, to all shrubby species of the genus. Employed by the Maoris as a tonic and purgative.

In cultivation it is very ornamental, and for the most part hardy; as such it has long been familiar in British gardens. At Trinity, some seedlings from Otago seed stood out four years, flowered and seeded in the summer of 1866, and were killed down nearly to the ground by the frost of January 1867. Other plants of similar age, and with similar foliage, but of very dense, burly, dwarf habit, have not yet flowered; but were not much injured by the same frost,

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(Gorrie.) In the Edinburgh Botanic Garden, however, V. salicifolia was "much injured" by the frost in question, (Macnab.) 17

The specimens in my Herbarium represent a shrub with woody branches. No part of the plant exhibits pubescence. Leaf generally 3" long and broad; lanceolate; midrib distinct on either surface; Margin in no case "entire;" in all my specimens a tendency to serration of margin; serratures vary in number and depth--generally few, small, and inconspicuous--sometimes distinct to the naked eye. Leaf, especially when young, dries very black on upper surface; large and membranous, as compared with that of V. elliptica, V. parviflora, and most other Otago species. Bracts subulate, not very rigid. Racemes 4-5" long, and their peduncles 1 1/2" long; giving a total length of 5-7"; constituent parts assume a blackish hue in drying (like the leaves). Sepals elliptical, acute, glabrous. Corolla in diameter; becomes lurid brown in Herbarium.

In a specimen of what appears to be this species in my Herbarium, from Glen Martin, the inflorescence is monstrous; and all its parts are larger than in the ordinary form of the plant, as above described from M'Coll's gully. Raceme not simple, but much branched and copiously flowered, producing a mass of blossom 3 1/2" broad, and 7" long. The parts of the inflorescence vary in size on the same compound raceme. The lower flowers on the main divisions of the raceme are few,--on slender filiform pedicels, which are much shorter than the long, linear-lanceolate bracts; latter sometimes long, flaccid and membranous. In the upper part of the raceme, and on its lateral branches, the flowers are crowded. All parts of the inflorescence are glabrous. Sepals more membranous and longer than in the type; equally acute; of a dark brownish colour, and with a thickened centre and sub-pellucid edges. Capsule about same length as calyx, with a very prominent, filiform, curving, long style (1/4-1/3" in length); acquires a black colour in drying.

Species 2. --V. elliptica, Forst. 18 Edge of the Bush, Willshire's Bay, mouth of the Clutha; December, in flower, (W. L. L.) Also an ornamental shrub-tree, with a stem sometimes 8-10" in diameter, frequenting both the west (Buchanan), and east, coasts.

My plant is small, varying from a few inches to a few feet high; very shrubby, with crowded foliage. Branches woody and stout, but glabrous. Leaves close-set and spreading; scarcely (or shortly) petiolate; about 1" long, and broad; elliptical-oblong; not truncate at base, but narrowing into a pseudo-petiole; entire; very coriaceous; acute or sub-acuminate; dry to a deep brown or blackish-brown on upper surface. Racemes about 1-1 1/2" long, with from 5-10" flowers; seated about the ends of the branches; not at all corymbose; pedicels very short and inconspicuous. Corolla large; limb nearly twice as long as tube. All parts

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of raceme dry to a lurid brown colour; the sepals, tube of corolla, centre of sepals and bracts, with their pedicels, being blackest or darkest in tint.

My plant was named elliptica by Dr. Hooker. But its characters do not correspond with the description given in the "Handbook," (p. 209). If it is really his elliptica, I cannot agree with him that it is so distinct a species or plant as he indicates. It has certain characters in common with V. laevis, V. parviflora, V. carnosula, Hook, f., and V. vernicosa, Hook, f., as these occur in my Herbarium, collected by Dr. Sinclair, in Tarndale, Nelson, and so named by Dr. Hooker. None of these species are, according to the specimens I have examined, quite "easily recognised." Nor do their characters, in all respects, correspond to those assigned to them in the "Handbook." Of the five species in question, V. vernicosa, however, appears to me more distinct than any of the others.

The classification of the group to which they belong, as given by Dr. Hooker in the "Handbook," (p. 205,) is not quite precise; and I doubt, indeed, whether in such a classification--in so variable a genus--absolute precision is attainable. The following characters, on which the division of the group is more or less founded (as well as other characters), are inconstant, and in virtue of being so, are insufficient for the purposes of such classification, viz.--

1. Leaf; form; entireness; acuteness or obtuseness of apex; texture.
2. Bracts; size.
3. Raceme; simplicity or complexity.
4. Flowers; number and size.

XII. --GEN. COPROSMA.

Its species are for the most part extremely variable, and but few are easily recognisable as distinct or well defined. Passage-forms between the present Book-species seem to abound,--a circumstance that appears to me to argue in favour of the establishment of more comprehensive types. The genus specially commends itself to careful study by the local Botanist, who must examine the directions, forms, and limits of variation, in the growing state, over wide areas. Some of the species are handsome Bush trees: others constitute, with species of Gaultheria, Carmichaelia, Discaria, &c., a large proportion of the "scrub" of the uplands. To some extent, the smaller species represent in Otago the Ericas and Callunas of Britain-having also the habit and habitat of some of our species of Vaccinium and Arctostaphylos.

Species 1. --C. lucida, Forst. East Taeri Bush; Stoneyhill Bush; Finegand Bush, Lower Clutha; Bush about the mouth of the Clutha, at, or sometimes below, high water level; top of the "Big rock," Saddlehill; November and December, young; (W. L. L.) One of the prevalent forest trees (along with "Red Birch" and "Red Pine,") on the shores of Thompson and Charles' Sounds, (Symms). As a forest-tree--at an elevation of 1,800 feet, about the head of

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Milford Sound--also on the West Coast, (Hector). The "Broad-leaf" or "Orange-leaf" tree of the settler; terms, however, which are probably not only applied to other species of the genus Coprosma, (e.g., C. robusta, Raoul,) but to species of genera belonging to very different families--and especially to Griselinia lucida, (N. O. Corneae,) whose foliage closely resembles that of Coprosma lucida, and with which it is extremely apt to be confounded in the young, or flowerless, state. C. lucida is also known to the Otago natives as "Kalamou" (Hector); and to the North Island Maoris as "Karamu," 19 "Kakaramu," or "Karangu," 20 (Colenso.) In some of my specimens of Coprosma lucida, (e.g., from Stoneyhill Bush,) the leaf is broadly ovate, obtuse or subacuminate, subcoriaceous; petiole generally does not exceed 1/2" to 1" long; in Herbarium, the leaf assumes a dark-brown or blackish-brown colour, (which occurs also in some other species, e.g., linariifolia, and parviflora,) resembling in this respect the foliage of Loranthus, (e.g., L. Colensoi). Sometimes, however, the leaf retains in great measure the beautiful green tint of its living condition. It is 4" long, by 2" broad, glabrous, and shining or glossy above.

The trunk and branches are liable to be infested by a large cannon-ball-like Fungus--Hypoxylon concentricum, Bolt. 21 In cultivation--whether as a shrub or tree--it becomes bushy with abundant beautiful foliage,--forming one of the greatest ornaments of the gardens or shrubberies of the settlers. It is one of the many Otago bush shrubs or trees, whose introduction in Britain is worthy subject of experiment. Buchanan describes its wood as close-grained and yellow; "might be used in turnery."

Species 2. --C. rotundifolia, A. Cunn. Stoneyhill Bush; East Taeri Bush, (bearing the parasitic Viscum Lindsayi); October, young, (W. L. L.)

Varies considerably in the form and size of the leaf, as well as in other particulars. In Stoneyhill specimens, the leaf is larger and broader than in those from East Taeri Bush; frequently broader than long; distinctly acuminate, though sometimes notched at the apex, instead of being pointed; from orbicular-oblong to broadly-lanceolate; very coriaceous or very membranous, and all gradations between stout and delicate; petioles long or short, stout or slender; leaf 1/4-1/2" broad, seldom exceeding long; branches divaricating at irregular angles, numerous or few, lax or close, stout or slender.

Dr. Hooker, in the Handb., (p. 114,) speaks of "a scrap only" from Hector and Buchanan as the only specimen he had seen from Otago or the South Island, My plant was, however, named by himself; and it, moreover, agrees essentially with his specific description.

Species 3. --C. linariifolia, Hook. f. Saddlehill uplands; East Taeri Bush; Manuka gully, Scroggs' Hill; October and November, young; (W. L. L.)

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The "Mikimik" or "Yellow Wood" of the Otago settler. A tall shrub, with erect, simple, slender branches, and sparse foliage; leaves linear-lanceolate, 1" or upwards long,--1/8" broad,--becoming very black in drying. Its wood is said to resemble that of C. lucida, and probably to be capable of similar economical applications, (Buchanan.)

Species 4. --C. parviflora, Hook. f. (C. myrtillifolia, Fl. N.Z., pr. p.) Saddlehill uplands; top of the "Big rock," Saddlehill; in the bush about mouth of the Water of Leith, Dunedin, affected by the parasitic Loranthus micranthus; October and December, young; (W. L. L.) Common as an element of "scrub" on uplands and in the bush; but exhibiting considerable diversity of characters, according as its habitat is exposed or sheltered.

The "Mingi-mingi" 22 of the Otago settler. The commonest form of the plant on exposed uplands is a smallish, stout, erect shrub, with strong, rigid, divaricating, shortish branchlets--standing out at right angles to the main stems or branches; more or less leafy,--the leaves being, however, small and inconspicuous. In Water of Leith specimens--growing in the shelter of the forest--the twigs and leaves are glabrous, branches stout, sparingly leafy; leaves blackish-brown or black when dry, especially on upper surface; very coriaceous; scarcely exceed long,--oblong-ovate, obtuse, with rounded tip, scarcely petioled, flat, rigid.

What Dr. Hooker names C. propinqua, A. Cunn., in my Herbarium, from Saddlehill, seems referable to C. parviflora, and has greatly the characters of Water of Leith specimens thereof. It is a large and straggling shrub, with longish, numerous, leafy, irregular branches; very different in aspect from the ordinary hill forms, with which it occurs in the same locality.

C. parviflora appears the most variable and puzzling of all my Otago species--the chief variations relating to size and form of leaf,--stoutness of stem and branches, and divarication of the latter.

Species 5. --C. acerosa, A. Cunn. Roadsides, Greenisland; sand-dunes about mouth of the Kaikorai; in the bush, ravines of the Chain Hills; October, young, (W. L. L.) The "Tatara-hake" of the North Island Maori. A plant universally found on sand-dunes in New Zealand, (Buchanan.) Whether growing in the Bush or on exposed uplands, the shrub is very stout and rigid, forming, with other common species of Coprosma, a more or less abundant element of "scrub." The plant has frequently the appearance of a large shrubby Galium--the branches long, slender, and straggling--the leaves short, acicular or linear, and fascicled--the flowers small and inconspicuous. "A most distinct plant," says Dr. Hooker--(its peculiar heath-like leaves distinguishing it from all its co-species); a statement that can be made in regard to very few indeed of the New Zealand species of Coprosma.

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XIII. --GEN. SOPHORA, (Edwardsia, Fl. N.Z.)

S. tetraptera, Aiton, var. microphylla, Jacq. (Edwardsia microphylla, Hook., Fl. N.Z.) As a bush; among scrub, uplands about Fairfield, Saddlehill; November, young. As a tree; roadside near the Taeri Ferry; December, in flower; East Taeri Bush and Greenisland Bush, (W. L. L.) Common in the skirts of the forests in all the districts I visited. Islets of the Clutha (Buchanan); in the forests of the Kaduku valley, and around the Kakapo Lake, (Hector); on the shores of the Te Anau and Manipori Lakes, (M'Kerrow); in the Makorora forests--sparingly; on the Wakatip Islands, arid generally in the Wakatip district, (Balfour); one of the chief ornaments of the Bush in the central (great Lake) districts.

The "Kowhai" of the North Island Maori; the "Kowai" of settlers,--or as the word is variously corrupted and spelt by them,--"Goai" or "Ghoai," "Goa" or "Ghoa." According to Hector, the type is known to the Otago Maoris as "Houma;" while the term "Kowhai" is applied to var. grandiflora in common with its other varieties. Var. microphylla is also sometimes designated by the colonists the Native "Laburnum" or "Mimosa," from the similarity of its foliage, in the arboreous condition, to that of these familiar and beautiful (cultivated) European trees.

As a tree it is very graceful, having much of the habit of our Laburnum; frequently drooping also over streams after the manner of Weeping Willows. Dr. Tuke, late of Wanganui, describes the type as the only New Zealand tree, which sheds its leaves in winter. In the North Island it flowers in September; and the flowering of this and the Fuchsia tree are two of the diagnostic features of that month in the Maori calendar. The only means the Natives have or use for distinguishing the different periods of the year is to characterize each moon (of which there are thirteen in the Maori year) by the flowering of certain familiar trees and shrubs, in combination with the migrations of certain birds and the motions of certain stars.

The species is very variable, both as to the general habit of the plant, whether as tree or shrub; and in regard to the size of the flower--the size and form of the leaflets--and the sparseness of both flowers and foliage. In order to study its variations, leisurely at home, in a state of cultivation, I caused to be sown under glass, in the spring of 1863, some seed, collected in the Silver Stream valley in January 1862, by my friend the Rev. William Will, of East Taeri Manse. The first set of seeds sown did not come up; and this being attributed to their not having been prepared for germination by steeping in warm water, the second set was steeped for a fortnight in a hot house tank--the average temperature of the water in which is 100°--sometimes rising to 120°. This procedure proved successful, in so far as the second series sown came up, though slowly;

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whereas no other native Otago seeds brought home by me, and sown under circumstances otherwise the same, except as to the steeping, germinated.

Two of the "Kowai" plants so raised had attained, after three years' growth in the shelter of a greenhouse, a height of about 4 1/2 feet. The following characters were observed in my seedlings (of four years' old): No flower has yet appeared; the foliage is sparse, and readily falls off under changes of temperature; the stem and branches are markedly zig-zag, repeatedly and oppositely geniculate, bending suddenly in opposite directions or at right angles to each other; they are very tough, and also very glabrous, shining, and of a wax-yellow colour. The general character of the shrub is very twiggy, and almost leafless or naked--so sparse and so minute is the foliage; the ultimate ramuscles, with the leaf-petioles and under surface of the leaflets, are sub-tomentose, with short, silky hairs; leaflets generally in four or five pairs, very small, broadly obcordate or sub-orbicular, notched at tip; leaves 1/2" to 1" long, petiolate and delicate.

Horticulturists, who are familiar with the trees in question in cultivation in this or other countries, unanimously regard Dr. Hooker's single species as too comprehensive, and as improperly including the old Edwardsia microphylla, Jacq.; E. grandiflora, Salisb; E. Macnabiana, and E. pulchella of Florists. Mr. Gorrie, for instance, who has for many years given special attention to the acclimatisation in this country of the hardier New Zealand trees and shrubs, writes me (January 1867). "That Dr. Hooker should consider all these as mere varieties is one of the botanical puzzles, which cultivators cannot understand." Gorrie regards microphylla as sufficiently distinguished from grandiflora, and the other two species, or pseudo-species, of Edwardsia, by the following permanent characters:--Small leaves; zig-zag, slender branches, and their loose ramification. Gorrie's microphylla, as cultivated by him at Trinity, is undoubtedly my Otago plant. From New Zealand seed ascribed to microphylla, Mr. Macnab has raised two shrub-trees, which he regards as separate species; but I have not myself seen them. Charles Moore, F. L. S., Director of the Botanic Garden of Sydney, N. S. W., regards microphylla and grandiflora as quite distinct. He has found that seedlings from the same part of New Zealand, raised in Sydney, show very different capability of cultivation; for while one thrives, the other dies.

In the Botanic Garden of Edinburgh; the Kinnoull Nursery, Perth; Mr. Gorrie's garden at Trinity, and elsewhere, I have had an opportunity of examining specimens--in various stages of growth--at least of Edwardsia grandiflora, E. microphylla, and E. pulchella. The latter, as a seedling, seems familiar to nurserymen; it has quite the characters of my Otago seedlings of var. microphylla, and obviously belongs thereto, It differs from grandiflora in its remarkable zig-zag branches and small leaves. In the old state--in a plant nine years' old, in the Edinburgh Botanic Garden--and occasionally in the upper branches of younger plants, there is less angularity than is common in microphylla; but it

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certainly does not differ from that variety to such an extent as to deserve separate nomenclature. E. grandiflora is stated by cultivators never to exhibit zig-zag angularity of the branches or stem, and they regard it as specifically distinct. In some old plants I saw, with woody stem, the leaves are larger, and the whole foliage handsomer than in the other Edwardsias; but even in the same individual, some of the young leaves on the lower branches are to be found quite as small as in pulchella.

It would appear, then, that some cultivators have no hesitation in setting aside grandiflora as a distinct species; while others do the same as regards microphylla. There remain only Macnabiana and pulchella. Of the former I have seen no specimens; while the latter I have no difficulty in referring to microphylla. All that I have seen and heard inclines me to regard Dr. Hooker as rightly associating all the trees or shrubs in question under a single species or type. None of the Edwardsias I have seen in this country have ever flowered, though many of the trees have attained considerable age (forty or fifty years) and vigorous growth; nor have I met with any record of their yet having flowered in Britain, even when protected by glass. 23

Nevertheless, there seems abundant ground for regarding the various forms of S. tetraptera as hardy in out-door cultivation in this country. Testimony, however, is by no means unanimous; though the failures, which have occurred, may have arisen from peculiarities of local climate. The fact of the tree thriving in the rigorous climate of the interior of Otago renders it at least probable that it should also successfully withstand the winter of Britain. At all events, inasmuch as the tree is a very ornamental one, the experiment of its acclimatisation in this country deserves more general attention.

My seedlings of three years growth, reared under glass, were so shrubby and healthy, that I was induced, in the spring of 1866, to plant one of them out, so as to test its ability to stand the Scottish winter. Protected only by blanketting--a questionable advantage--it has successfully withstood the severe frosts of winter and spring, 1866-7, --having lost its foliage temporarily, but not till March, 1867. The other specimen was planted out in spring, 1867. Both specimens were exhibited at the Floral Show of the British Association, in Dundee, in September, 1867,--then both five-year-old seedlings, 4-5 feet high. Both were in vigorous growth; that which had been exposed to the winter of 1866-7 was shorter, but stouter and less handsome, than that which had had throughout its growth the benefit of green-house protection during winter. Mr. Gorrie showed me a plant that had survived several winters in the open air, in his garden at Trinity; and he tells me that young seedlings from Otago seed have stood beside walls with different exposures about Edinburgh for several winters, and were unhurt by the

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frost of January, 1867. Microphylla also withstood the winter of 1860-1, on a wall at Castle Kennedy, near Stranraer; and Mr. Gorrie saw, in autumn of 1866, a plant about six feet high, standing in the open ground at West Shandon, on the Gairloch, which he was told was originally a cutting from a forty-year-old tree, grown on the banks of Loch Long, E. microphylla is grown as a hedge shrub in Jersey. E. grandiflora grows out, against walls, on the Fife coast, to a height of 10-15 feet, (Greig). On the other hand, E. grandiflora, E. Macnabiana, and E. pulchella, all formed large plants on a south wall of the Edinburgh Botanic Garden prior to the winter of 1837, when they were killed by a severe frost, which also, however, destroyed all the Arbutus, Bay Laurels, and other hardy evergreens. Mr. Macnab regards the New Zealand Edwardsias as half-hardy only; they may successfully stand, he reports, one or two winters, but are liable to be killed by severe frosts. Hence here, and in the majority of Botanic Gardens and Nurseries, these Edwardsias are to be found under glass. In Kinnoull Nursery, E. microphylla is grown in a cold pit, covered with matting. A plant so grown, twelve years old, is not taller than my five-year-old seedlings. It is far from handsome, and is represented as of extremely slow growth.

The timber of all, or some, of the forms of S. tetraptera possesses properties which render it valuable as firewood, and in the arts of construction. It is represented as very durable, hard, tough, close-grained, and sometimes handsomely marked, having a strong resemblance to Laburnum wood--an additional illustration of the comparability of the "Kowhai" tree with our Laburnum. Balfour, (C. E.) found its ultimate strength to be 170-275 lbs.; and its sp. gr. .667-1.037. The Otago settlers regard the timber of the trunk as too valuable to burn, inasmuch as it is the nearest indigenous equivalent to our Oak. It has been used to a considerable extent in the construction of bridge and wharf piles. From the old jetty of Dunedin, sound piles have been removed after twelve or thirteen years alternate exposure to the action of sea water and the atmosphere--at high and low tides, (Balfour). But at Port Chalmers, on the other hand, piles have been found eaten through in less than fourteen years by Limnoriae. Balfour recommends it as well suited for cabinet work and turnery; while Dr. Tuke says it is "too small-grained for sawing, but well suited for furniture." It is variously used also by the cartwright and carpenter. The chief use to which "Goai" timber was put in Otago, during my visit, was the constructing of posts for fencing, for which it appeared to compete successfully with "Manuka" and "Totara." In the Greenisland district, "Goai" is a good deal used as firewood, and some settlers prefer it to all other kinds. In burning, it is said to give out showers of sparks like fireworks. Balfour refers all the valuable "Goai," or "Kowhai," timber, with doubtful propriety I think, to var. grandiflora--whose trunk is said to attain large dimensions in the interior of the North Island, but rarely exceeds 12-16" in diameter in Otago.

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XIV. --GEN. PHORMIUM.

This is one of the numerous genera of New Zealand flowering plants, the variations of whose species are most puzzling to the systematist; it is, moreover, one whose numerous and important economical applications render it of importance that we should possess a complete knowledge of the forms and limits of such variation, both in the wild state and under cultivation. It is well known, both to settlers and Maoris, that different varieties of the Flax plant yield very different qualities of fibre; but as yet we cannot be said to know precisely what are the botanical varieties that furnish the finest kinds. Indeed, our knowledge of the Natural History of the genus cannot be regarded as satisfactory or complete in any particular. It is impossible properly to study so large and coarse a plant in Herbarium specimens; the student must devote himself to the examination of living forms over wide areas; and therefore it is to the local botanist we must look for the correction of our present imperfect knowledge of the botany of such a plant as the New Zealand Flax. To him I would commend the following points as, inter alia, still remaining to be accurately determined:--

1. Whether there are properly three (or more) species, or only one?

2. What are the principal permanent variation-forms, or varieties--
a. In the wild state? and
b. Under cultivation f

3. What varieties or forms yield the finest qualities of fibre?

4. What is the effect of cultivation--on those varieties in reference to their fibre-produce, or in the production of varieties economically useful?

5. What are the best modes of preparing the fibre for manufacturing purposes on the large scale?

6. What are the best dyes? and what is the best mode of fixing them?

7. How far can New Zealand Flax compete, especially as regards price,
a. With rags in Paper making?
b. With Flax, Manilla, Coir, and other fibres, for Cordage?
c. With Linen, Cotton, and other fibres or hairs, for Textile fabrics?
This includes the consideration, How far, or whether, it will "pay" to cultivate New Zealand Flax.

8. Whether, to what extent, and in what forms, can any of its products be utilised in Medicine?

Dr. Hooker, in his Handbook, (p. 286,) describes two species, P. tenax, Forst, and P. Colensoi, Hook. f.; and he restricts the distribution of the former to the North Island; but I have no reason to doubt that it extends to the southern extreme of the South Island, if I am right in assigning the common New Zealand Flax of Otago to P. tenax. I visited the provinces of Otago, Nelson, Wellington, Taranaki, and Auckland. The Flax plant seemed to me essentially the same in

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all; its characters were those assigned by Dr. Hooker to P. tenax 24 rather than those of his P. Colensoi. I noticed no forms corresponding with the latter species; while I saw no variations of sufficient permanence or importance to warrant, in my estimation, separate nomenclature. The common Flax of Otago appears to me to possess the characteristics of tenax, as contradistinguished from Colensoi, if these are really--or deserve to be considered--separate species; and as tenax it is hereinafter mentioned. P. Colensoi is apparently what the Maoris designate "Whakariki," (syn. "Wharariki"--"Wharaeki") according to the late Bishop Williams, of Waiapu, and which he defines variously as "a stunted kind of Flax plant," and as "a species of Flax."

Buchanan, on the other hand, describes in Otago two varieties of New Zealand flax (N.Z. Exhibition Catalogue, p. 70), viz.:--

a. Characterised by a dark red flower; triangular, erect capsules; strong, broad, erect leaves; and

b. A more slender plant, with smaller flower, inside petals greenish; capsules round, 4" long by 1" broad, drooping; leaves narrower, twisted, drooping; fibre narrower, finer.

Dr. Thomson also ("Story of New Zealand," vol. i. p. 206) speaks of one species and two varieties. Haast describes "several well marked varieties," as occurring in the mountainous western districts of Nelson. The North Island Maoris have long recognised a number of varieties, each characterised by a particular quality of the fibre it yields, each quality of fibre being used in the native manufacture of some special kind of wearing apparel. The principal sorts of cloak or mantle at present made by the Maoris from their native flax are--

1. The "Korowai," or shaggy mantle.

2. The "Kaitaka," or fine mantle; and

3. The "Pokeha," or rain cloak. 25

Of these, the variety of flax plant called "Koura" yields the best fibre for the "Korowai." Purchas and Minnis of Auckland, one of the most successful recent patentees of a process for the preparation of New Zealand flax fibre on the large scale--as well as other manufacturers--make a similar selection, using mostly the fibre of the leaf--old or young--of that variety or species known to the natives

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as "Tihori," or "Tihore,"--all other forms being found to yield a coarser fibre. But it remains to be determined what are the precise botanical varieties or species designated "Koura" and "Tihori," if their botanical characters are such as to warrant their separate nomenclature. Prior to the colonisation of New Zealand, each of the numerous tribes of natives in the North Island was distinguished for the manufacture of some particular kind of mat or cloak, which became, to a certain extent, its special or diagnostic badge; and each of these mats was said to be made from the fibre of a different kind (variety or species) of flax plant. Travellers and residents have described and named at least a dozen different sorts of mats so made; hence, were we to accept as of value such testimony, we should be led to the conclusion that there must be several varieties, if not species, of Phormium, in New Zealand. That there were, and are, different qualities of flax-fibre, from which such mats were, or are, made, cannot be doubted; but it is a legitimate subject of question, whether these differences are not altogether, or at least partly, due to differences--in habitat or soil,--in the mode of cultivation of the plant, or in the preparation of its fibre. The Otago settlers believe there are at least three different kinds of the native flax plant.

On the whole, I believe the purposes of science will be best subserved by establishing a single type or species, and naming only its principal permanent and and well-marked variation-forms. This nomenclature of varieties becomes of importance in such an exceptional case as that of New Zealand flax, if it can be shown that they are characterised by equally constant variations in the quality of fibre.

P. tenax, Forst. Uplands in the Greenisland district, most abundant; November and December, in flower; top of the "Big Rock," Saddlehill; Tuapeka ranges; Inch Clutha, and opposite banks of the Lower Clutha, abundant, (W. L. L.) Gullies opening upon the Clutha in the south-eastern districts, "variety, with a drooping capsule," (Buchanan). Islands and banks of the central and upper Clutha, abundant, (Pyke). Banks and "flats" of the Matukituki Kiver and Wanaka Lake, "in the greatest abundance," (Sullivan). About the mouth of the Waiau "in rank luxuriance," (M'Kerrow). Bligh Sound, luxuriant in one or two patches, (Symms). Generally common on the west coast fjords, and on or in the central ranges and valleys. This is the long-familiar "New Zealand Flax" plant or "Flax Lily;" 26 terms which must now be held to include P. Colensoi, if the latter is to be retained as autonomous.

Its distribution is sometimes extremely local or capricious. In some localities, where it might he expected, it does not occur. Symms observes, for instance, that while it grows luxuriantly in one or two patches about the mouths of some of the streams or rivers opening into Bligh Sound, it does not occur on the shores of Thompson and Charles Sound--all on the west coast. While very common in

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the environs of Dunedin, it occurs in very small patches--and even these at considerable distances apart--about Oamaru (Sullivan). The same traveller states, as an illustration of local differences of climate in the interior, that at McLean's station on the Lindis River, the New Zealand flax-plant will not grow. In the northern parts of the province generally--as is the case with the "Toot" plant--P. tenax is comparatively rare. Such peculiarities of local distribution are probably dependent--in great measure at least--upon differences in the character--chemical or physical--of the soil.

The New Zealand Flax plant grows, however, on all kinds of soils--sometimes on the dry slopes of hills. It frequently occurs intermixed more or less with grass and fern, over large areas of hilly country--at elevations, however, mostly under 2000 feet. On the west coast of Nelson, Haast describes it as everywhere abundant, ranging as high as 5,500 feet on the mountains. At such elevations, considerable variation in its botanical characters must be expected. It chiefly, however, affects somewhat rich, low-lying, alluvial soils, on open swampy land or moorland. Hence, next to bush and swamp-land proper (on alluvial clays), Flax-land is regarded the most desirable for agricultural purposes. "Flax-swamps" are frequently as common as "Tussock-swamps," 27 though their soil is far from being so wet or watery. Like the "Tussock-swamps," they are frequently very "tussocky"--causing walking thereon to be extremely irregular and fatiguing.

The plant is frequently or generally social or gregarious--growing in such numbers as to form somewhat extensive jungles. These jungles, in their native state, are sometimes penetrable with as great difficulty as the primitive "Bush." The plants generally considerably overtop a man, and their strong, coarse leaves and stems oppose a formidable obstacle to his progress. These "Flax-jungles" are, however, rapidly disappearing before progressive settlement. The chief agencies of their extermination are-

1. The agricultural operations of the settler--by (a) Grubbing; or (b) Firing.
2. Cattle: and
3. Immigrant Weeds.

In "clearing" Flax-land, the plant is destroyed, on the small scale, by grubbing it up by the root; on the large scale, by burning. In the latter case, it comes up again. But if cattle are then permitted access--being very fond of the young shoots--they nip the latter off successively till the plant dies. The plant is also destroyed by being trodden down by cattle, whose hoofs break up the soil, and prepare it for the reception of the seeds of clover and the other so-called "artificial grasses," on which they are destined to feed. These alien fodder plants generally grow with great ease and rapidity--taking the place of the disappearing flax, and assisting, indeed, materially in its ultimate extermination.

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Cultivation has been found to improve the plant in all respects. It grows more rapidly and luxuriantly, and yields a better quality of fibre. 28 The latter fact has long been familiar to the observant Maoris, who, before New Zealand became a British colony, and for some time subsequent thereto, were in the habit of carefully cultivating the plant for the sake of its fibre alone. Wakefield, 29 for instance, describes extensive Flax-cultivations on the table land above Ikurangi, in the North Island. The soil selected was rich, low-lying, loamy; it had originally been fern-covered; but the fern had been burned off, and flax seeds scattered in the ashes. The plants were 8 feet apart, and were growing most luxuriantly. The variety of the plant invariably found in Maori cultivations--as yielding the finest quality of fibre--was that known as "Tihore"--with leaves 10-12 feet long, New Zealand Flax is a perennial; its leaves attain full length only in the third year of its growth,--maturity being marked by their splitting at the ends. 30 Cultivation is described as easy; for, as a perennial, neither ploughing nor sowing require to be repeated." 31 This is a fortunate circumstance, of great importance in connection with future and permanent market supplies of the leaf-fibre. In cultivation in its native country, the plant yields sometimes two and a-half tons per acre of leaf; while four to five tons of the fresh leaf give one ton of available dried fibre. 32

The New Zealand settlers have a high opinion of the facility with which the New Zealand Flax-plant might be acclimatised in Britain, and in all our colonies, whether tropical or temperate. The Victoria (Australia) Acclimatisation Society also describe it as most easily grown and multiplied, and as extremely hardy, It may be grown, according to this authority, "in inundated places, not readily available for other cultivation." 33 They recommend it for cultivation without protection in the southern parts of Britain, and generally for naturalisation in all countries that have not a rigorously cold climate. That the experiment has not only been made, but has succeeded, in Britain, is proved by the fact that at a meeting of the Botanical Society of Edinburgh, in March 1850, Dr. Macdonald shewed specimens of the leaf 6 1/4 feet long, from a plant grown in the open, without protection even during winter, in Argyleshire. In Jersey, it has been found to grow luxuriantly, flowering freely in moist exposed positions, with a westerly aspect. In Guernsey, too, Dr. Sieveking mentions it among "many other rare plants of distant lands," which "luxuriate in this lovely island as if it were their home." 34 Mr. Gorrie tells me he never heard of the plant suffering from the

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winter cold on the west coast of Scotland; or south of Ireland, where the leaf often attains a length of 5 to 6 feet. In other parts of Britain, however, its growth is most capricious. Thus, it is not hardy at Perth, though it grows vigorously in the open at Largo, in Fife. In the Botanic Garden of Edinburgh it is killed down some winters, while in others it grows hardily in the open. Old plants were killed down in 1837, but sprang again from the roots. This generally happens in unusually severe winters. The leaves were injured a good deal by the frost of January 1867 (Macnab). At Balgreen, near Edinburgh, it suffered very severely from the same frost; and Dr. Lowe writes to me, it "may be considered as living with us, certainly not thriving" On the whole, however, it is one of the many New Zealand plants, which must be regarded as virtually hardy in outdoor cultivation in Britain (Gorrie). As a greenhouse plant, it has long been familiar in British horticulture. I saw it at Kew in 1862 and 1865--in the New Conservatory--but in leaf only. Like many New Zealand plants, however, it has been treated too much as half-hardy, requiring protection, if not also warmth, during winter. I have little doubt that extended experiments on its out-door growth will justify Mr. Gorrie's opinion that it is hardy, and may be grown in many parts of this country, without protection.

I found P. tenax in abundant flower in Otago in 1861-2; but the settlers tell me it flowers only once in two to four years, 35 cotemporaneously with the "Cabbage Palm," or "Ti Tree," (Cordyline australis, Hook, f., N. O. Liliaceae.) They allege, moreover, that the seasons in which these typical native plants flower are invariably fine fruit-seasons; that is, probably, they are dry and warm above the summer average. I never noticed the flower yellow in the native state of the plant.

The number of special names bestowed by the natives on different varieties and on different parts of the Flax-plant--on different qualities of the fibre, and on the leaf and fibre in various stages of conversion into cordage or textile fabrics--may be held to indicate how abundant is the plant--how familiar to the Maoris--and how important and numerous its economical applications. In Otago the general name of the plant, as a whole, is "Korari,"--or as metamorphosed by the settler, pronounced and spelt "Kouraeri," or "Coradi." 36 The same term is applied in the North Island equally to the whole plant, and to the dried flower-stem when cut for rafts or other purposes; or exclusively to the flower-stalk. In the North

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Island, the Flax-plant is also known as the "Harakeke," or "Herekiakia,"--its usual name there. Dieffenbach defines what is obviously the same term, "Herakiaki," as "green dried flax" while "Arekeke" is "undressed flax." The lower part of the flower-stem is "Kaikaha;" the outer part of the leaf "Parakoka;" the refuse of the leaf "Hunga-hunga;" the flax, dressed or not, or scraped fibre, manufactured from the leaf, "Whitau," or "Muka." The Maori names applied to P. tenax also probably apply to P. Colensoi, which has hitherto been confounded or combined--and perhaps after all properly so--with the longer known P. tenax.

XV. --GEN. CORIARIA.

By reason of its including the too-familiar and fatal "Toot" plant, this genus is one of no secondary importance to the New Zealand colonist. Nor is it deficient in interest, on very different grounds, to the botanist. It possesses pre-eminently that attribute so characteristic of New Zealand plant-genera--Variability of species. According to the views adopted as to What is, or constitutes, a species, the New Zealand Coriariae are divisible either into, at least, four species, or are to be regarded as mere forms of a single protean type. 37 If we accept Bentham's definition of a species, (as given in his "Outlines of Botany," prefixed to Dr. Hooker's Handbook, p. xxiv.) and regard it as a reality in Nature, and not as an artificial abstraction--an arbitrary arrangement of the botanist--I cannot see that it is possible to admit of more than one New Zealand species of Coriaria,--inasmuch as it is quite conceivable that all the forms occuring in that country may have been descended from a common parent! In 1862, I examined all the Coriariae contained in the Kew Herbarium, with this result,--that I found such a continuity of variation--such a connection of so-called species by intermediate or passage-forms--that it appeared impossible to define or limit them by any permanent characters of sufficient value. 38 There seemed utter confusion between the three species recorded in the Handbook Fl. N.Z. Book-characters were found to be fallacious guides to natural forms, being of the most inconstant kind even in the same plant. Variation affected chiefly the size and form of leaf and raceme, (with all its parts,) and the annual or perennial duration of the plant, as well as its general habit. Under such circumstances, it seems to me at least quite as philosophical to establish a single comprehensive type, and regard all the New Zealand forms as variations thereof,--as to constitute four species, which avowedly pass, sometimes imperceptibly, into each other.

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There are, however, obvious reasons of convenience for the latter step, though it would appear that four--instead of the three species mentioned in the Handbook--are in this case desirable or necessary. If we are to regard plant-species as mere distinctions of convenience, made by man, though not by Nature--the necessary results of strainings after classification in regard to organisms, that are frequently indefinitely variable, I concede the advisability of establishing the following four New Zealand species of Coriaria:--

Species 1. --C. arborea, 39 (C. ruscifolia, Auct. pr. p.) The "Tree Tutu;" which Dr. Hector 40 asserts is quite distinct from the common "Herbaceous Tutu," or "Tutu" proper. This is a tree, with a large trunk, whose timber is available in the arts. The wood is soft, "beautifully marked in the grain, and might be introduced with effect in light cabinetwork," (Buchanan, N.Z. Exhib. Catal., p. 66-- where, however, the plant is named as in the Handbook Fl. N.Z., C. ruscifolia). On the west coast of Otago, "great forests, one might call them, of Tree Tutu occur, and "not a plant of the square-stemmed herbaceous Tutu growing, moreover, "at all altitudes," so that it is certainly not to altitude that is to be ascribed the difference in habit between this and the following species, (Hector). It is probably to this form that Sullivan alludes as becoming a very large tree, averaging 2 feet in thickness, in the primitive west coast forests (about the forks of the Jackson and Haast Rivers). Tree Toot also occurs in the forests of the Te Anau and Manipori Lakes.

Species 2. --C. Tutu, 41 Lindsay "On the Toot Poison of New Zealand;" Proceed. British Assoc., Sect. D. (Botany), Cambridge, 1862, (C. ruscifolia, Auct. pro. max. parte.) What has hitherto been described as C. ruscifolia is apparently partly referable to the preceding; while, so far as it represents this, the common herbaceous "Tutu" of New Zealand, it is far from being well defined. Dr. Hooker describes it as perennial; while Dr. Hector asserts it is always annual 42 and angular-stemmed. The species requires revision. It may prove that it includes more than one species or more than one variety; in any case, redefinition of characters is essential.

C. Tutu, (C. ruscifolia L.,) is, or includes, the only form of the Toot plant I commonly met with in Otago. Glen Martin, Saddlehill; November, in flower, common form; among "scrub," Chain Hills; October, in flower, common form;

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M'Coll's gully, seaward aspect of Saddlehill, December, in fruit (of previous season); Tuapeka ranges, abundant in some places, (W. L. L.); Tapanui ranges, and banks of the Clutha, S. E. districts, (Buchanan); in thickets at head of the Kakapo lake; among scrub, and in the bush of the interior (lake districts,) and West Coast, (Hector); on the flats and banks of the Matukituki river and Wanaka lake, "in the greatest abundance," (Sullivan); in general terms, more or less common on hill and glen sides--in bush or scrub--throughout Otago. Up to 3000 feet on Mount Egmont, Taranaki, (Buchanan). --Common on open lands, frequently intermixed with "Fern," (Pteris aquilina L., var. esculenta, Forst.); under whose shade or shelter it sends up its succulent, 43 young, spring shoots. In the Dunedin district, and generally in settled districts, the plant is fortunately fast disappearing under advancing cultivation, being displaced and replaced by the hardier alien and immigrant weeds of Britain, and other northern countries.

The too-well-known "Toot" of the Otago farmer; the "Wine-berry shrub" of the early settlers about the Bay of Islands, (according to Dr. Bennett, 44 and the "Treasury of Botany"); the "Tutu," "Tupakihi," and "Puhou" of the North Island Maoris; the "Taweku" of the Waikatos; the "Tupake" of Coromandel district; the "Tua-tutu" of Otago, (Hooker.) Of these designations, the most familiar, important, and comprehensive is "Tutu." This term appears also to be a generic or general one--indiscriminately applied to all the New Zealand Coriariae--especially, perhaps, the larger forms. Not only, however, does it refer to the plant as a whole, but in some districts, to particular products thereof. In the East Cape dialect it is applied to the juice of the "Berry" (so-called--but which really consists of the short triangular petals, that, after flowering, become fleshy--are closely appressed to the carpels--or "seeds" so called--and when ripe are full of a luscious purple juice.) Dieffenbach again defines "Tutu" as a "Wine made from the Berries of the 'Tupakihi.'"

The specimens I collected were unquestionably perennial; in some localities I gathered the young shoots of the same year, while in others I found the fruited, shrubby, woody plants of a previous year. The following were the chief Variations of character in the series collected within a limited area by myself:--

Leaves sometimes not quite opposite, or irregular as to site; upper amplexicaul, others sessile; none distinctly petioled; frequently unsymmetrical, irregularly expanding or sublobate at base; varying from ovate through oblong-ovate into broadly lanceolate; length generally 1" to 2", breadth 3/4" to 1"; frequently acuminate, tapering sometimes to a longish point, varying, however, in its distinctness

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and length; nerves vary from three to six; three are generally distinct on upper surface., sometimes only distinct on lower; seldom five, but sometimes on under surface of a broad leaf six are perceptible; occasionally no distinct neuration save the midrib, or there is only one nerve; while, on the other hand, there may be as many as seven to nine visible on the under side, or it may be marked by reticulation arising from the repeated subdivision of six to eight delicate irregular nervures; in Herbarium sometimes dry to a blackish olive, especially the young shoots, 45 and on the upper surface, or they may acquire a general yellow tinge, or yellow-mottled appearance on the same surface. Stem grooved. Racemes--pubescence sometimes very slightly marked; general length 3 1/2" to 4"; Pedicels under 1/4", sometimes so short as to be scarcely perceptible, varying in length on same plant; distinctly bracteolate, bracts lanceolate; flowers more or less closely arranged. 46

In plants bearing old fruit of a previous season, the fruit is sometimes nearly as closely arranged as in the cylindrical spike of a Plantago; achenes more reniform and less compressed than in the type; with the sepals, become blackish-brown; racemes sometimes closely clustered, and containing flowers more numerous and more densely arranged than is common; leaf longer in proportion to breadth, of paler colour, more coriaceous, frequently obtuse at tip, generally with only three nerves visible, either on upper or under surface; stems woody.

The variation in my Otago plants, however, is inconsiderable as compared with what I have observed in Nelson specimens collected by Dr. Sinclair, which are, in great measure, passage-forms into C. thymifolia. In Tarndale specimens, belonging apparently to the ruscifolia type, the leaves approach those of my Otago plants--with generally three nerves--having a tendency to a lanceolate form--their colour more natural--the racemes laxer and fewer-flowered--the pedicels longer.

From the same district of Nelson, I have seen various forms, which it is impossible to arrange either under ruscifolia or thymifolia, as these are defined by Dr. Hooker. They partake of the characters of both,--larger plants a great deal than thymifolia, with lanceolate leaves very different in size and form from those already described as belonging to ruscifolia; they are indeed passage-forms. The plant must be several feet high, for the mere branches in my Herbarium are over 1 foot long: it is a very handsome shrub, with generally regular foliage. The leaf, however, varies much in size even on the same plant; it is lanceolate, acute; length 1 1/4", breadth less than; on the larger leaves three nerves--a central and two

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sub-marginal; in the smaller leaves, frequently only one nervure, and that indistinct; upper always more linear and smaller than lower; some of the stem-leaves semi-amplexicaul, and more ovate than the others; racemes less pubescent than in many other forms of ruscifolia, lax, few-flowered, long; flowers about as large as in ruscifolia, but achenes more symmetrical--more compressed and paler in colour. The difficulty of deciding whether such plants are to be regarded as small-leaved forms of ruscifolia, or large-leaved forms of thymifolia, illustrates the present unsatisfactoriness of the characters of these Book-species.

Like so many of the arboreous and herbaceous Phaenogams of Otago, Toot exhibits certain peculiarities of local distribution. For instance, it is "curious to remark," says Sullivan, that the whole country between the Otamitita River and the Lindis Gorge, in the northern interior, is entirely free of it; while it occurs only in one locality in the environs of Oamaru. In the northern parts of the province generally, it may be said indeed to be absent. In other localities, again--in the south and west--it frequently forms what the settlers call "natural shrubberies," covering extensive areas.

Species 3. --C. thymifolia, Humb. The "Tutuheuheu," (Manteli) or "Tutu-papa," (Colenso) of the North Island Maoris. Western slopes of Flagstaff, and in Silver-stream valley, December; where it appeared to me to be simply a hill-form of ruscifolia. In all Herbaria I have examined, I have found numerous forms connecting this on the one hand with ruscifolia, and on the other with angustissima. In the Herbarium of Dr. Sinclair, at Auckland, I found specimens labelled C. thymifolia from Tarndale, Nelson--some of which had leaves approaching in size those of ruscifolia, while in others they were so small as to approach angustissima. It is obviously indeed a passage form between the ruscifolia and angustissima types, Dr. Hector describes it as a small-leaved rigid plant, with the habit of a Vetch, found only on the Waitaki, and in a few other localities in Otago. Buchanan describes its branches as "always flat;" and he regards it as "certainly different" from the following species.

Species 4. --C. angustissima, Hook. f. Is uniformly regarded by the colonists as a separate species. Dr. Hector says, this is "totally distinct from the rest, having a light feathery form, with drooping leaves, which resemble those of "Manuka," (species of Leptospermum), and are much smaller and much more linear than in any of the other species it occurs generally by the sides of streams, and is found at all elevations from the sea level up to 2000 feet, associated frequently with one or other of its co-species. It would thus appear not to be an alpine form merely of any of the other species. Buchanan describes it as in form "like a bottle-brush, with fine line-like leaves." This description does not, however, agree with the characters of any Herbarium specimens I have seen.

This small and narrow-leaved, diminutive, inconspicuous plant has a very different aspect from the large-leaved, large-berried tree-which is frequently as

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large as our Elder; nevertheless, I have met with all the intermediate links that connect the two, not only in New Zealand, but in South American, and other suites of, specimens in various public and private Herbaria.

Genus Coriaria.--If only typical or extreme forms be examined, the student will have little difficulty in accepting the foregoing as good species, well distinguished from each other by habit. But if he extend his observation to large suites of Herbarium specimens--and still more to forms in the living state over wide areas--he will not fail to find them connected by transition-states, which he will frequently be puzzled to refer to one Book-species rather than another, partaking, as they do, of the characters of two or more of these species. He will find that where Nature does not draw lines or set limits, the Systematist does, and he will fruitlessly endeavour to discover, perhaps, on what principles such arbitrary demarcation or classification is based.

Some of the forms of the Toot plant are both ornamental and hardy in cultivation in this country. There is good ground for supposing that they might be introduced with advantage to a much greater extent than at present. I found the ordinary Toot of Otago--(type of C. Tutu, with a medium-sized leaf)--growing well in the open, against walls, at Trinity, near Edinburgh. Seedlings, cultivated by Mr. Gorrie at the base of walls with both northerly and southerly exposures, withstood the cold of last (1866-7) and the three preceding winters; though the leaves and shoot-points were killed by the frost of January 1867. The New Zealand Toot seems as hardy as the South European C. myrtifolia. The shoots of both are sub-herbaceous, and though killed by certain severe frosts, the loss is replaced by a new growth from the root.

I have to repeat that the genus Coriaria, as it occurs in New Zealand, requires careful revision by local Botanists; to whom I would commend, as specially deserving their attention, such points as the following:--

1. Is it possible, or proper, to establish, by characters of sufficient permanence and value, the four species already mentioned? or,

2. Is it preferable to regard them as mere forms of a most variable single type?

3. What are the prominent directions, forms, and limits of variation in New Zealand; and as contrasted, e.g. with South American species?

4. What species or varieties are annual or perennial, or both?