96 Transactions. — Botany. 



placement of native by introduced plants," and others to be re- 

 ferred to later on, are of great oecological interest. But of all 

 works on New Zealand vegetation the one which most concerns 

 us here is that of Diels, entitled " Vegetations-Biologie von 

 Neu-Seeland," which appeared originally in Engler's Botan. 

 Jahrbuch for 1896. Although the author had never set foot 

 in New Zealand, yet, with the aid of a considerable number 

 of herbarium specimens, and of whatever literature was avail- 

 able, he wrote an oecological account of the vegetation of New 

 Zealand and its adjacent islands. He also touched at some 

 length on the origin of the component parts of the flora. 

 Part of the data concerning the plants of the montane, sub- 

 alpine, and alpine regions was, in response to a request from 

 Dr. A. Engler, furnished by me. Now, since some of my 

 statements may not have been altogether correct, I may be 

 allowed for my own credit's sake to explain that I distinctly 

 stated in a letter to Mr. Diels that I could not guarantee 

 their scientific accuracy, since they were written from memory 

 for the most part, and not from observations taken note-book 

 in hand from the plants in their habitats. Nor had I any 

 idea of the scope of the proposed work, or I might have been 

 more cau.tious still. Be that as it may, the work appeared, 

 and, when the conditions under which it was written are con- 

 sidered, it is indeed a work of no small merit. That it should 

 contain errors goes without saying ; the only marvel is that 

 it does not contain many more. At any rate, it marks a 

 distinct epoch in New Zealand botany, and now it remains 

 for local botanists to supersede it with something more full 

 and more accurate. To fulfil this want in some small mea- 

 sure will be attempted in this present work. 



That a field botanist in a distant colony can endeavour to 

 solve any of the very difiicult problems which plant oecology 

 presents is hardly to be expected. The very fact of being at 

 active work in the field hinders the close study necessary 

 before approaching and while engaged in such work ; also, 

 the almost entire lack of recent literature makes critical work 

 quite out of the question. These higher problems — e.g., the 

 verifying or disproving hypotheses by accurate physiological 

 experiments ; the collecting multitudes of facts from the 

 records of many writers ; considering such, and deducing con- 

 clusions therefrom ; or the examining material collected from 

 all over the world to establish some point — such work and 

 the like can only be attempted by men of great natural ability, 

 special knowledge, and vast learning, with the most modern 

 appliances to hand, and access to the literature of any parti- 

 cular subject. But such specialists, at home in their labora- 



* T. Kirk, "The Displacement of Species in New Zealand" (Trans^ 

 N.Z. Inst., vol. xxviii., p. 1). 



