254 Transactions. 



I desire to express my gratitude to Dr. L. Cockayne, F.R.S., and to 

 Dr. C. Chilton, C.M.Z.S., Professor of Biology in Canterbury College, 

 Christchurch, for the encouragement and advice they have given me 

 during the last two or three years, and to the former also for many sug- 

 gestions with respect to this paper; also to Mr. C. E. Foweraker, M.A., 

 of the Biological Laboratory, Canterbury College, who has given me great 

 assistance in the preparation of objects for the paraffin bath. 



I. Occurrence and Habit. 

 L. Selago Linn. 



This species is common in Europe, and is well known from the investi- 

 gations of H. Bruchmann (6) and C. E. Jones (13) and others, so that 

 it will need but slight notice in this paper. It occurs commonly through- 

 out the South Island of New Zealand in damp places as a member of 

 fell-field, herb-field, and sometimes subalpine Nothofagus forest, and 

 elsewhere on the high mountains. 



'■t::'- 



L. Billardieri Spring. 



This species is found in the forest throughout New Zealand. Though 

 typically an epiphyte, growing pendulous from tree-fern trunks and the 

 upper branches of forest-trees, it also not uncommonly grows on the 

 ground. In North Auckland it is met with on peaty soil in groves of 

 Leptosjjermum. On the volcanic islet of Rangitoto, Auckland Harbour, 

 it grows on patches of humus among the blocks of scoria. In South- 

 land and Stewart Island it occurs frequently on the damp forest-floor 

 on patches of humus at the base of large trees. In one instance I 

 found a single " seedling " plant growing on a bush-road clay-cutting. 

 Tlie individual plant consists of a main stem, which in its short under- 

 ground region is sparingly branched. Ihis underground portion is 

 covered with r^cale leaves, and bears a number of roots at its lower 

 end. These )oots are much branched, and are covered in their ter- 

 minal portions with a mat of rhizoids. At or near the surface of 

 the soil the stem branches dichotomously several times to form a tuft 

 of aerial stems. When the plant is epiphytic these aerial stems hang in 

 tresses from 1 ft. to 4 ft. in length (see Cockayne, L., fig. 6, in " Report 

 on a Botanical Survey of the Waipoua Kauri Forest," 1908); when 

 terrestrial the plant is more or less upright, and in some instances it 

 is then hardly to be separated from L. varium. Several plants gene- 

 rally grow together, their subterranean portions thickly interpenetrating 

 the patch of humus. The appearance of the plant, with its dichoto- 

 mously branched aerial stems and numerous long terminal tetragonal 

 fertile spikes, is well illustrated by Pritzel's figure of L. Phlegmaria 

 in Engler and Prantl (9). 



L. varium R. Br. 



This plant is stated by Cheeseman (7) to be probably only an extreme 

 form of L. Billardieri. It is sometimes epiphytic, but it occurs in those 

 parts of New Zealand subject to a semi-subantarctic climate, and on 

 Stewart Island and the Subantarctic Islands of New Zealand more com- 

 monly as an erect, stout, rigid terrestrial plant. On Stewart Island I 

 found it growing on the forest-floor in large patches, some of which 

 were as much as 12 ft. across. 



