xxxii INTRODUCTION. 
no species of Eucalyptus. Only fragments of the New Caledonian flora have been 
published, but from a rough manuscript list of New Caledonian plants contained in 
the Paris Herbarium, compiled by Sir Joseph Hooker twenty-five years ago, the 
Australasian character of the vegetation is evident. Examples are offered by such 
genera as Cordyline *, Dianella, Araucaria, Frenela, Dacrydium, Hedycarya, Casuarina 
(five species), Exocarpus, Grevillea, Cenarrhenes, Knightia, Stenocarpus, Myoporum 
(four species), Leucopogon (twelve species), Dracophyllum (ten species), Hibbertia 
(fifteen species), Pittosporum (twenty-five species), and Boronia (eighteen species). 
It is noteworthy that the phanerogamic flora of New Caledonia, unlike that of New 
Zealand, is exceedingly rich in species, yet, as in New Zealand, many characteristic 
Australian groups of plants are wholly wanting. 
The flora of New Zealand has been so exhaustively discussed by Hooker, Wallace, 
Engler, and others, that it is inexplicable why Drude should have raised it to the rank 
of a primary region. It is remarkable for its poverty and the total absence of many of 
the most characteristic Australian types; yet, apart from the extraordinary development 
of such widely spread genera as Ranunculus, Epilobium, and Veronica, the flora is so 
essentially Australian that it is difficult to understand why there should be any hesi- 
tation in treating it as a subregion of the Australasian flora; especially by an author 
who would include the Sandwich Islands in the Indian region. 
As far as the Flora of Madagascar and adjacent islands is concerned, the reasons for 
regarding it as a primary region are more intelligible; and some zoologists have pro- 
posed the same thing ; but recent explorations prove that it should rank asa subregion 
of Africa. Although rich in endemic genera and species, it is not relatively more 
so probably than the Malay Archipelago or Ceylon in Asia, It is true that the small 
order Chlenaces is apparently peculiar to the island, for there is little doubt that the 
two members of this order recorded from Mozambique were collected by Forbes on 
the Madagascar side of the channel of that name. Briefly, the forest flora of Mada- 
gascar.is. closely related to that of tropical Africa, while South-African forms reappear 
in the hill flora; and it exhibits still closer affinities with Mauritius, Bourbon, and the 
neighbouring islands. 
Sufficient has been advanced perhaps to show that Drude’s divisions are not always 
the best that could be devised, and that his primary divisions are too numerous, OY, 
from another standpoint, not numerous enough to attain the nearest approach to 
equality. 
Ten years ago Mr, Thiselton Dyer { drew up a concise and pregnant sketch of the 
* It must not be assumed that the generic identifications hastily made are in all instances absolutely 
correct. 
t+ See Baker in ‘ Journal of Botany,’ 1881. 
t “A Lecture on Plant Distribution as a field for Geographical Researches,” Proceedings of the Royal 
Geographical Society, xxii. 1878. 
