28 THE SHRUBS AND HERBACEOUS PLANTS OF NEW ZEALAND 
eating birds. Its scarlet-flowered relative, known as parrot’s bill, 
(Clianthus punicius, 12), is more imposing, and has long been intro- 
duced into English gardens. Glossostigma (G. elatioides 2), and 
Goodenia (G. repens) in mossy profusion cover the quaking ground. 
Three large shrubs alone claim attention as characteristic swamp 
species. The palm lily, or cabbage tree (Cordyline australis) gives 
a tropical aspect to the landscape, and owes its name to use by early 
settlers, as a culinary vegetable, of its flower buds. The “ Phormium 
tenax” is doubtless the most important plant in the colony, supply- 
ing aS it does in its large fibrous leaves the so-called commercial 
New Zealand flax or hemp. Both these plants belong to the 
Liliaceze, and have no connection with either the flax or the hemp 
plants of the Old World. 
The remaining plant is the toi-tol grass (Arundo conspicua) 
closely allied to the pampas, but, to my mind, much more graceful 
as it bends to the wind. 
A glance only at the open downs or “ sheep country,” where the 
natural tussock grasses (Poa caespitosa) (and Festuca duriuscula) have 
enriched many a squatter, and whence he musters his teeming 
flocks in the early spring, ere the piri-piri, a pretty herb of the 
Rosaceze (Aczena sanguisorbze, 10) ripens its hooked and spinous 
fruit, which clings to the valuable fleece and depreciates it. 
Such downs are often carelessly fired, thus destroying the natural 
herbage which is not easy to replace, because the introduced grasses 
are seldom permanent in these situations. Still more deplorable, 
apart from lawful felling and clearing, are the wanton bush fires, 
beautifully, yet sadly, deseribed by the Hon. W. P. Reeves :— 
“The forest fire streams bright, 
Clear, beautiful, and fierce it speeds for man 
The Master, set to change and stern to smite, 
Bronzed pioneer of nations !—ay, but scan 
The ruined wonder wasted in a night, 
The ravaged beauty God alone could plan, 
And builds not twice! a bitter price to pay 
Is this for progress—beauty swept away.” 
ue” 
