298 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF THE 



landed. Whilst my friends amused themselves on the strand 

 and skirts of the forest overhanging the bank, I ascended its 

 steep acclivity, and with some difficulty effected a penetra- 

 tion througli its underwood to the pitch of the ridge which 

 appears generally to characterize the banks of this stream. 

 Among several plants, unknown at present to me, being 

 without fructification, that form small trees from fifteen to 

 twenty-five feet high, I rejoiced to recognise a few of the 

 genera of Forster, viz.: — Veronica elliptica, a woody plant 

 richly in flower, Corynocarpus lavigatus, showing flowering 

 spikes, a very ornamental slender tree, with dark-green glossy 

 foliage, Coprosma lucida^ with clustered axillary flowers, 

 Gaultheria antipoda. Cineraria {BrachygloUis) repanda, a 

 remarkable shrub with large ramified panicles, Panax arbo- 

 reum, Lotus arboreus, {Carmichaelia australis, Br.,) I also 

 gathered specimens of a shrub of Gentiance, and seemingly of 

 our colonial genus Logania {Geniostoma ligustrifolium, A. 

 Cunn.,) Leucopogon sp. of Mr Brown's first section, &c. In 

 these woods, teeming with humidity, cryptogamous plants 

 abound. I gathered a few Mosses, and some Ferns of the 

 genera Poll/podium, Aspidium, Asplenium, Davallia, {hoxsoma^ 

 R. Br.), Doodia, and Pteris, some of the first genus adhered 

 to trees, but among the parasites {Astelia?) 1 could not per- 

 ceive any of that most interesting tribe OrchidecB. That genus 

 of Proteacea, Knighda, I remarked a mere shrub, but never- 

 theless putting forth flower-buds. On the margin of these 

 woods, just beyond the reach of the flood-tide, I perceived 

 Myoporum latum, Lepidium oleraceum, and a branching tree 

 thirty feet high, with ternate and quinate leaves {Vitex lit- 

 tornlis, A. Cunn). In penetrating these woods, I met with 

 much impediment from the arundinaceous supple rambling 

 stems of a Smilax {Ripogonum parviflorum) , a single species 

 of scandent Rulm, (R. cissoides, A. Cunn.,) with quinated 

 narrow leaves, and the wiry stem of a species of Lygodium 

 (L. articulattim,) without fructification. Quitting this shore, 

 we stood up the river a short distance, and again landed at 

 a small native village, consisting of a few miserable hovels, 



