Coprosma. | RUBIACER, 243 
limb 4—5-toothed or -lobed or almost truncate, often absent in the 
males. Corolla funnel-shaped or campanulate, 4-5-lobed or 
-partite; lobes valvate in the bud. Stamens usually 4 or 5, 
inserted at the base of the corolla-tube; filaments long, filiform ; 
anthers exserted, pendulous. Ovary 2-celled, rarely 3- or 4-celled ; 
styles the same number as the cells, free to the base, filiform, far- 
exserted, papillose-hirsute ; ovules solitary in each cell. Fruit a 
fleshy oblong or ovoid or globose drupe, with 2 (rarely 4) 1-seeded 
plano-convex pyrenes. 
A genus of about 60 species, having its headquarters in New Zealand; found 
also in Australia and Tasmania and northwards to New Guinea and Borneo ; 
also stretching through Polynesia as far as the Sandwich Islands and Juan 
Fernandez. In New Zealand it everywhere forms a large proportion of the 
shrubby vegetation, and is equally plentiful in lowland forests or subalpine 
woods, often forming dense and sometimes almost impenetrable thickets. One 
species ascends the mountains to a height of 6000 ft., and reaches as far south as 
Macquarie Island, where it is the sole ligneous plant. The species are extremely 
variable in habit, foliage, and vegetative characters generally; and, as the 
flowers are small and inconspicuous and very uniform in structure throughout 
the genus, it is no easy matter to obtain good distinctive characters, even when 
dealing with fresh specimens. In the following account I have adhered to the 
plan adopted in my monograph of the New Zealand species, published in the 
“« Transactions of the New Zealand Institute ” (Vol. xix., pp. 218 to 252), to which 
reference should be made for many details which cannot be given here. 
In attempting to determine the species of Coprosma really good and well- 
selected specimens showing both foliage and flowers are indispensable. Both 
sexes should be collected ; and, as important characters are often afforded by the 
fruit, it should be obtained also, if possible from the same plant from which the 
female flowers were taken, notes being preserved of the shape, size, colour, 
and other characters lost in drying. Notes should also be kept of the habit and 
amode of growth, some of the closely allied species being easily distinguished by 
that alone. As the characters on which the species are founded are to a great 
extent comparative, the student must not expect to make much progress until 
he has collected a considerable number of the species and carefully compared 
one. with another. The small-leaved species included in section B are par- 
ticularly difficult to identify until most of them have been studied in detail. 
In many of the small-leaved species the flowers are closely invested by one 
or more series of connate bracts, each series being composed of a pair of minute 
depauperated leaves and their stipules. The upper series usually forms an 
unequally 4-toothed cup-shaped involucel, and is easily mistaken for a calyx, 
especially in the male flowers, where the true calyx is often entirely wanting. 
It is perhaps necessary to state that, with one or two exceptions, I have 
examined authentic specimens in Mr. Colenso’s herbarium of the 16 species 
described by him in various volumes of the ‘‘ Transactions of the New Zealand 
Institute.” They are for the most part absolutely identical with previously 
described species, and the remainder differ so very slightly that they cannot be 
separated even as varieties. 
A. Erect shrubs or trees. Leaves large, over lin. in length. Flowers fascicled 
on lateral peduncles ; fascicles usually many-flowered. 
* Peduncles 1-3in. long (short in C. macrocarpa), trichotomously divided ; 
fascicles dense. 
Leaves 3-7 in. long, coriaceous. Pedunclesl-1din. Fruit 
very large, 3—} in. long ae di ae -. L. C. macrocarpa. 
Leayves4-9in.,membranous. Pedunclesl-3in. Fruittin. 2. C. grandifolia. 
Leaves 2-5in., coriaceous. Peduncles1-2in. Fruittin. 3. C. lucida. 
