PLATE 56.—FUCHSIA PROCUMBENS. 
Famity ONAGRACEZ.] [Genus FUCHSIA, Linn. 
Fuchsia procumbens, R. Cunn. ex A. Cunn. Precur. n. 534; Cheesem. Man. N.Z. Fl. 187. 
Quite apart from the interest which from the point of view of geographical 
distribution must always attach to the presence in New Zealand of three species 
of the otherwise purely South American genus Fuchsia, there are certain biological 
facts concerning the New Zealand species which deserve more searching examination 
than has yet been given to them. I allude to the curious heterostyled flowers 
which all the species produce. Mr. T. Kirk, who was the first to investigate the 
matter with any detail, showed that in F. excorticata and F. Colensoi there are three 
forms of flower, each with a style of different length, which can be distinguished 
as the long-styled, the mid-styled, and the short-styled forms; and that these 
differences in the length of the styles are correlated with differences in the 
length of the stamens, the long-styled form having the shortest stamens, and the 
short-styled form having the longest. The remaining species, F. procumbens, the 
subject of this plate, possesses the three kinds of flower differmg in the length of 
the style, but the stamens are the same length in each case. 
The discoverer of F. procumbens was Richard Cunningham, who in 1834 
collected it at Matauri Bay, a little indentation on the coast-line between Whangaroa 
and the Bay of Islands, and situated almost directly opposite the Cavallos Islands. 
It was first described by his brother, Allan Cunningham, in the well-known 
“ Precursor,” and a few years later was figured by Sir W. J. Hooker in the 
“Icones Plantarum” (t. 421) from specimens collected in the same locality by 
Mr. Colenso. From an examination of this plate, and from Cunningham’s 
description, it is evident that the plant was the one now recognized as the long- 
styled form, the large globose stigma being far-exserted beyond the flower. For 
many years no further information was obtained, and no one supposed that other 
forms of the species existed. In December, 1867, however, Mr. T. Kirk gathered 
a Fuchsia in Tryphena Harbour, Great Barrier Island, that differed from 
Cunningham’s plant in the shorter broader flowers, and especially in the short style, 
which was entirely included in the flower, the stigma being much below the level 
of the anthers. These differences were so noticeable that Sir J. D. Hooker treated 
the plant as a distinct species, and figured it in the “ Icones Plantarum ” (t. 1084) 
under the name of Fuchsia Kirkii. But he also acknowledged that in habit and 
foliage the two plants were identical, and that at first he was inclined to regard 
the differences as sexual. A few years later another form of the species found 
its way into cultivation, in which the style was of intermediate length, the stigma 
being on the same level as the anthers. This discovery proved that F. procumbens 
agreed with F'. excorticata in possessing three distinct forms of flower, but differed 
(as has been stated above) in the stamens being of the same length in each form. 
Since the publication of Mr. Kirk’s paper on “ Heterostyled Trimorphic 
Flowers in the New Zealand Fuchsias ” (Trans. N.Z. Inst. xxv (1893), 261) 
much information has been obtained respecting F. procumbens, and some of 
his conclusions require modification. In the first place, the species is not nearly so 
rare as he supposed, as will be seen from the following list of localities : Cabbage 
Bay, J. Adams! (short-styled form) ; Tryphena Harbour and Mine Bay, Great 
Barrier Island, T. Kirk! A. J. Osborne! L. T. Griffin! (short-styled form) ; 
Whangarei Heads and coast near Ngunguru, T. F. C. (short-styled form) ; 
Whangaruru Harbour, T. Kirk (short-styled form); Matauri Bay, R. Cunningham 
