OF AUCKLAND, NEW ZEALAND. 215 
at the bottom an expanse of foliage like a carpet, where may be recog- 
nized readily the broad summits of Puriri (Vitex littoralis), different 
species of Metrosideros with their scarlet blossoms, the graceful Rewa- 
rewa (Knightia excelsa), and other trees, amongst which are beautifully 
conspicuous the star-like heads of arborescent ferns. Beneath this will 
be found another still mdre attractive sight in the immense variety of 
ferns, mosses, and ur growing on the trunks of fallen trees 
and on the banks of the small stream which threads its way along the 
bottom of the ravine. In one of these glens, not more than a mile 
from the town, I have collected within the space of 100 yards no less than 
thirty-six species of ferns, including three kinds that are arborescent. 
- The moderate temperature of the climate and the frequency of 
showers, with the very moist atmosphere passing from sea to sea over 
this the narrowest part of the island, are circumstances highly fa- 
vourable to vegetation. Though there is no timber growing near 
Auckland except in these ravines, yet there is little doubt that at one 
time the forest extended over the whole isthmus; as the occasional 
exposure of trunks of trees that have been buried, the abundance of 
kauri gum found mixed with the soil, and the mounds of burnt clay, 
like the fragments of bricks, where kauri-trees once stood, fully attest. 
Much of the forest has been destroyed by accidental fires, but it has 
suffered more from the natives “ eating their way into it," as they say, 
to bring fresh ground under cultivation. 
"The most interesting spot for a botanist near Auckland is the Ma- 
nukau forest, about eight miles off in a straight line. In it are found 
nearly all the timber trees of the colony, and amongst them, the most 
imposing in appearance is the Kauri. It is, however, not so large 
here as in the forest on the banks of the Kaipuru, the Hokianga, and’ 
at other places farther north. The Manukau forest may be called the __ 
present limit of the tree on that side of the island, there being very —— 
few examples of it farther south, and these very small, although, from — — 
the quantities of the gum to be met with in the soil a great distance 
beyond, it must have grown abundantly there in former times. The 
quantity of Kauri timber in the forest which stretches from Manukau 
harbour to the heads of the Wairoa and Kaipuru appears inexhaustible, 
and a great portion of it is not of difficult access. It is only, however, 
on the banks of the latter rivers that spars of sufficient size for the 
Royal Navy can be found. Though the cutting of the timber has 
gone on since the establishment of the colony, little impression has yet 
VOL. III. 2r 
