244 Transactions. — Botany. 



had an opportunity of examining the forest in the following 

 places : Enderby Island, where I almost passed through the 

 belt into the tussock beyond ; Ewing Island ; near the depot 

 at Port Eoss, in the north of Auckland Island ; at the head 

 of Musgrave Inlet ; at Camp Cove, Carnley Harbour, where I 

 ascended right through the forest-belt on to the subalpine 

 meadow. 



On Enderby Island there is a considerable quantity of 

 rata forest and scrub, which forms a somewhat narrow belt 

 on the east and south sides, the whole of the west side of the 

 island, according to Captain J. Bollons, being a tussock for- 

 mation. This forest-zone consists of Metrosideros lucida and 

 Dracophyllum longifolimn, with an undergrowth of Suttonia 

 divaricata, Coprosvia fcetidissima, and the semi-arborescent 

 fern Aspidium vestitum. Proceeding through the forest to 

 the north, the Metrosideros becomes less in quantity and 

 more stunted, while Casdnia vauvilliersii makes its appear- 

 ance, this shrub finally becoming dominant. It seems from 

 this that we have here to do with two formations — viz., the 

 true rata forest and a scrub in which Cassinia vauvilliersii 

 is the leading plant— but I have not sufficient data to make 

 any statement on this head. My notes say nothing about the 

 height of the Metrosideros trees ; probably they are some 5m. 

 tall. The view within the forest is amazing in the extreme,^ 

 and to give a lifelike and vivid word-picture of the appearance 

 of the trees is quite beyond my powers of description. The 

 trunks of the ratas are frequently prostrate from their bases 

 for more than half their length. Fi-om such prosti'ate trunks 

 are given off many naked branches much twisted and gnarled. 

 The ultimate branchlets are erect, and form with the foliage 

 a dense flattened head to the tree, whose spread is altogether 

 out of proportion to its height. Such spreading branches 

 may measure + 60 cm. in diameter. In this forest Draco- 

 phyllum longifohuvi is common, and is frequently furnished 

 below with many "reversion-shoots," having much broader 

 leaves than those of the adult and similar to those of juvenile 

 plants. Viewed from a slight eminence, the roof of the 

 forest presents a dense green appearance, and one tlms view- 

 ing it from above would think the whole formed a thick, low, 

 shrubby growtii such as the heaths of northern moorlands. 

 Through the rata-foliage the Dracophyllum puts forth its 

 erect, straight, needle-like leaves for a short distance. The 

 undergrowth consists of shrubs of Coprosma foitidissiina and 

 the very densely growing Suttonia dicaricata (76), while the fern 

 Aspidium vestitum spreads out abundantly its arching dark- 

 green fronds of Im. or more in length. The floor of the forest 

 here, as in all parts of the Auckland Islands, consists of wet- 

 tish peat. In many places it is bare, perhaps owing to the 



