118 NEW ZEALAND PLANTS. 



The tussocks rank with the forest and the meadow as an 

 astonishing feature of these islands. Their habit is that of the 

 niggerhead described in Chapter VII. On Antipodes Island, and in 

 some parts of the Auckland Group, they are in many places quite 

 4 ft. tall, and grow so closely that to make any progress at all one 

 is compelled to walk upon their tops (see frontispiece). On Anti- 

 podes Island these tussocks take the place of arborescent growth, and 

 it is curious to see the little parrakeet peculiar to the island perched 

 and swaying on the drooping grass-leaves. Where the tussocks are 

 lower, the albatros rears its young, bringing daily the supply of food. 

 Here, too, the baby birds, clad in downy robes of snowy whiteness, each 

 seated on its cheese-shaped nest, brave for months the piercing 

 antarctic blasts, until their time shall come to seek the white-topped 

 waves and follow in the wake of the great ships. 



Although Macquarie Island belongs to Tasmania, biology derides 

 the claims of nations, and emphatically declares it to be three-fourths 

 New Zealand and the rest Fuegian. This latter claim is specially 

 emphasized by the immense cushions of Azorella SeJago, the Fuegian 

 rival of our vegetable-sheep. 



The Snares, the nearest to Stewart Island of the subantarctic 

 group, do not contain nearly so many peculiar plants, though they 

 have an Aciphylla and a species of Stilbocarpa not found elsewhere. 

 They form, as might be expected, a connecting-link with Stewart Island. 



Disappointment Island, in the Auckland Group, the scene of the 

 terrible ' ' Dundonald ' wreck, is the home of countless mollymawks. 

 Cast your eye over the dreary landscape, and you will see brown 

 meadow dotted with white birds, and here and there patches of vivid 

 green. This last arises from the presence of the antarctic burr (Acttant 

 Sanguisorbae, var. antarctica}. As the tussock, with its accompanying 

 plants, is slowly but surely destroyed by the many generations of 

 birds, this burr takes complete possession of the bare ground, thanks to 

 its colonising-power, for the barbed fruits adhere to the feathers of the 

 young birds, and so are spread broadcast. The burr is really quite a 

 rare plant in the tussock meadow, and so we have a remarkable example 

 of a plant originally of little importance becoming, in a virgin vegeta- 

 tion, virtually a weed. But tussock will again predominate, and 

 gradual alternate destruction and rejuvenation of the vegetation will 

 always be in progress a natural rotation of crops indeed, thanks to 

 the presence of mollymawks. 



