904 NOTES ON SOME PLANTS OF OTAGO, NEW ZEALAND. 
rich virgin loam, and in the moist shade of the forest itself, it generally 
grows luxuriant and succulent, and more like our ordinary British 
weed. Myres Bush, Inch Clutha; very luxuriant. Chain Hills, where 
it is sometimes a tall, bare plant, nearly 1 foot high, with a few delicate 
leaves about its base, and a small head of flowers. October to No- 
vember, in flower; December, in fruit, W. L. L. More or less abun- 
dant in every part of the province I visited, Otago specimens being 
usually quite indistinguishable from British ones. Generally under 
1 foot high. Stem in one specimen $ inch, in most others 4 inch in 
diameter. Variations in the size and degree of division of leaf infinite. 
Sometimes it is 23 inches broad, and about as long; and from this 
dimension it varies to 1-11 inch long, 1 inch broad. Leaves all more 
or less divided, though the divisions are not so numerous, or narrow, 
or toothed as in Fifeshire specimens in my British herbarium ; di- 
vision extends to midrib or not. Petiole sometimes 1} inch long, at 
other times it is absent, the lamina extending to the stem, from 
which the leaf is given off. Sometimes none of the leaves (in Chain 
Hill specimens) are large and deeply pinnatifid, with a large terminal 
lobe; but all are comparatively simple, and all clasp the stem, and are 
scarcely petiolate. Teeth frequently have scarcely a prickly character. 
Heads in all my specimens close, few, and panicled. Achene glabrous, 
longitudinally striate (ribs not very prominent), rugose, with trans- 
verse wrinkles, Involucre and peduncles quite glabrous. 
The same problem occurs here as in the case of Taraxacum Dens- 
leonis, viz. how, and whether it is possible to distinguish the indi- 
genous from the naturalized plant; for the imported English “ Sow- 
thistle ” is undoubtedly much more abundant than the native plant, — 
overrunning the country, with other species of Sonchus, and with species 
of Carduus and other hardy British Composite. The Maoris are said 
to recognize a distinction between the native and introduced forms ; 
they are in the habit of chewing its hardened juice as a salivary stimu- 
lant and in lieu of the narcotics, which the Malay and Polynesian 
islanders use in a similar way ;* and experience has taught them to 
prefer for such a purpose the introduced to the native plant. But I 
confess myself unable, as in the case of Taraxacum, to discover any 
good botanical distinctive character. Such are its resemblances to the 
* As they also use Kauri gum and Bit . Thomson’s ‘ Story of New 
Pied scl. p. 106. pane ae gs SE 
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