Composite. | FLORA OF NEW ZEALAND. 151 
quite entire, toothed or pinnatifid, very irregularly cut. — Scapes longer or shorter than the leaves, often downy above. 
Heads 1-2 inch long. Involucre narrow, campanulate, of one series of linear, erect, fleshy scales, with membranous 
borders; surrounded at the base by two series of much smaller, ovate, acuminate scales. Florets all ligulate, yel- 
low, with narrow spreading ligule and short tubes. Achenia linear, quite smooth. Pappus pale yellow-brown, of 
one series of slender, smooth bristles, expanding below and becoming paleaceous. Receptacle smooth, glabrous, 
pitted.—This plant is common to Tasmania and South Australia, varying extremely in both countries, sometimes 
attaining a height of nearly 2 feet, with leaves as broad as the finger: these vary extremely in amount of lobing, 
being entire, or pinnatifid, with long, narrow, spreading segments an inch long. The only other species is also a very 
variable and quite similar plant, found on the west coast of Chili; it differs from this only in the broader hairs of 
the pappus, which are quite paleaceous. (Name from juxpos, small, and cepis, a lettuce.) 
1. Microseris Forsteri, Hook. fil.; foliis anguste linearibus integerrimis sinuato-dentatis pinnatifidisve 
lobis elongatis, pappi setis basi solum anguste paleaceis. , Scorzonera scapigera, Forst. Prodr. Banks et 
Solander, MSS. et Ic. Monermos Lawrencii, Nob. in Lond. Journ. Bot. v. 6. p. 124. Microseris pygmæa, 
Raoul, Choix de Plantes, p. 45. non Hook. et Arn. Leontodon lactucoides, Banks et Sol. MSS. et Ic. 
Has. Northern and Middle Islands; frequent in many places, especially along the east coast, from the 
Thames river southward, Banks and Solander, ete. 
In the ‘London Journal of Botany’ I proposed making this plant a subgenus of Scorzonera, to which it had 
been referred, having failed to reduce it to any genus of this difficult tribe described in De Candolle; it is, how- 
ever, truly congeneric with the Microseris of Chili, as rightly determined by M. Raoul, but the species is quite a 
different one. 
Gen. XX. PICRIS, Z. 
Capitulum multiflorum ; flosculis omnibus ligulatis. Involwert squamæ imbricatæ, exteriores patulæ. 
Receptaculum nudum. Acheni sulcata, jugis apice transverse rugosis. Pappusl-2-serialis; pilis plumosis. 
Tall, erect, leafy herbs, with milky juice, of which one European species also inhabits various parts of India, 
Australia, Tasmania and New Zealand, varying considerably, especially in hairiness, in all places, being sometimes 
nearly smooth, at others very hispid with stiff spreading bristles. Stems 2—4 feet high. Radical leaves petiolate, 
linear-oblong, blunt, more or less sinuate, toothed and hispid; cauline smaller, sessile, linear, acuminate. Panicle 
loosely branched; peduncles long and slender, often quite smooth; pedicels bracteolate. Involucres 1-1 inch long, 
campanulate ; scales in two to three series, hispid and pubescent, the outer shorter, often recurved, inner long, forming 
one row, acuminate. Flowers all ligulate, yellow ; rays spreading. Pappus of one series of fine white feathery soft 
hairs. Achenia contracted above, turgid below, furrowed, the ridges tuberculate.—The other species of this genus 
are chiefly natives of the South of Europe. (Name from rrixpos, bitter, as is the juice of this and many others of 
the tribe.) 
1. Picris Žöeracioides, L.; plus minusve hispido-pilosa, foliis petiolatis oblongo-lanceolatis sinuatis 
dentatisve caulinis basi semiamplexicaulibus, capitulis corymbosis, acheniis superne constrictis striatis trans- 
verse rugulosis. Linn. Sp. Pl. A. Cunn. Prodr. 
Var. B. glabrata. P. attenuata, A. Cunn. Prodr. 
Has. Northern Island. Dry hills about the Bay of Islands, etc., Cunningham, etc. 
I cannot distinguish this from the common European plant, which I have also gathered in the Himalaya 
Mountains at 9000 feet elevation. The var. 8 is only a rather more slender and smooth state of the plant. 
