168 Transact ion s. 



Handbook of the N.Z. Flora, p. 49. Hooker's description is very short and 

 inadequate. But the branchlets are described as glabrous, while the flowers 

 are smaller than in the above rupestral plant. Considering that Carmichaelia 

 Monroi Hook. f. and the Clarence Valley plant grow on opposite sides of 

 the same range of mountains, and that the ecological conditions of both 

 areas are not very different, it seems fair to offer the suggestion that perhaps 

 Hooker neglected to note the hairy branchlets of the Awatere plant, and 

 that the groups here discussed are not distinct, but one and the same. But 

 this question can alone be decided by comparing Awatere and Clarence 

 Valley material and growing both rupestral and debris plants from seed 

 and then cultivating the seedlings under identical conditions. 



Coming next to Carmichaelia Monroi in the sense used by Kirk and 

 Cheeseman, this is invariably a low- growing shrub with dense erect branch- 

 lets forming open flat cushions on stony ground. But an examination 

 of the material of this species at my disposal and a comparison with the 

 descriptions of Hooker, T. Kirk, and Cheeseman respectively have led 

 me to the opinion that more than one varietal group is included. For 

 instance, Petrie's Otago specimens have glabrous calyces — a marked contra- 

 distinction to Hooker's description of his Awatere specimens as having a 

 " hoary " calyx. Also, specimens collected by me in the Eastern Botanical 

 District have almost tomentose calyces, while Cheeseman describes the calyx 

 as " silky, sometimes densely so," but he does not suggest that it is ever 

 glabrous. These Otago specimens, too, have triangular, but not narrow- 

 triangular, calyx-teeth as given by Cheeseman, while the Eastern Botanical 

 District plant has small calyx-teeth. 



From the above it seems clear that the Otago plant at least should be 

 separated from its allies as a variety, but I do not propose to take this step 

 until the taxonomy of the whole group is made clear. 



Again, there is an allied but much taller plant than the above cushion- 

 form. This I have collected at Biversdale (Waimakariri Biver basin) and 

 on the Waimakariri River bed on the Canterbury Plain near the protection- 

 works. A specimen was planted by me in the gardens of the Biological 

 Department, Canterbury College, but, unfortunately, before I could describe 

 it, it was killed during the building of the new chemical laboratory. Another 

 living plant was for many years in the old " native section " of the Christ- 

 church Botanical Gardens, and it may still be there. Also, there is in my 

 herbarium, under the MS. name Carmichaelia humilis, a specimen collected 

 by Mr. Petrie in the North Otago Botanical District. 



To sum up, there is a group of more or less low-growing forms of 

 Carmichaelia closely allied to and including Hooker's original C. Monroi 

 which does not consist of a number of identical individuals, but of minor 

 groups distinguished from one another by well-marked characters, so that 

 the major group is either a collection of closely allied species one of which 

 is Carmichaelia Monroi, or this latter should be treated as an aggregate 

 species consisting of perhaps five quite distinct varieties. 



29. Cassinia albida (T. Kirk) Cockayne. 



In Trans. N.Z. Inst., vol. 38, pp. 368-69, 1906, after considerable 

 experience both with Cassinia Vauvilliersii Hook. f. and the var. albida 

 T. Kirk, I proposed to rank the latter as a species. Cheeseman (Trans. N.Z. 

 Inst., vol. 39, p. 446, 1907), criticizing my procedure, said that the course to 

 be followed in this matter would " depend largely on the point of view and 

 personal judgment of the observer, coupled, of course, with a full consider- 



