PuatTE. 25—GERANIUM TRAVERSIIL. 
Famity GERANIACE4.] [Genus GERANIUM, Linn. 
Geranium Traversii, Hook. f. Handb. N.Z. Fl. 726; Cheesem. Man. N.Z. Fl. 89. 
This handsome species was discovered by Mr. H. H. Travers in the Chatham 
Islands during a botanical exploration of the group made in the year 1863-64, and 
has since been gathered or observed by all botanists who have examined the 
vegetation of the islands, but has not yet been collected on any part of the 
mainland of New Zealand. Mr. Travers’s specimens were placed in the hands of 
the late Baron Mueller, and were referred by him to the widely distributed 
G. dissectum, which in some of its forms is found in most parts of the north and 
south Temperate Zones. But this disposition of the Chatham Islands plant has 
found no followers, as it evidently differs from all the varieties of G. dissectum in 
the silvery-hoary pubescence, 1-flowered peduncles, large flowers, and minutely 
reticulated seeds. It was accordingly described as a new species by Sir J. D. Hooker 
in the second part of the ‘‘ Handbook,” under the name which it now bears. 
Geranium Traversii appears to be abundant on maritime rocks on all parts 
of the coast of the Chatham Islands, and is also found in rocky situations some 
little distance from the sea. It succeeds well in cultivation, and is now established 
in several New Zealand gardens. In its usual state the flowers are white ; but a 
pink-flowered variety has been found in a wild state, and appears to retain its 
characters under cultivation. 
It is a remarkable fact that not less than thirty species of flowering-plants are 
confined to the Chatham Islands, the total flora of which, including both the 
phanerogams and vascular cryptogams, does not exceed 220 species. The per- 
centage of endemic species is thus rather over 14 per cent. A ratio so large as this 
cannot be said to offer much support to the theory so often advanced of the former 
connection of the islands with New Zealand during Pliocene times. 
Puate 25. Geranium Traversii, drawn from specimens cultivated in the garden of the late 
Mr. H. J. Matthews, Dunedin. Fig. 1, flower, with 2 of the sepals and all the petals removed (x 3) ; 
2, petal (x 2); 3 and 4, stamens (x 8); 5, pistil (x 8); 6, seed (enlarged). 
