JULY. 125 



one peas, beans, lupins, clovers, broom, etc. might be 

 taken as a type of all the rest. There is a calyx made of 

 five joined sepals, a butterfly-shaped corolla (hence known 

 technically as papilionaceous) made of five separate and 

 oddly-shaped petals ; and ten stamens, which are either all 

 joined into one tube, or of which nine are joined and 

 one stands by itself. Another of the divisions of this large 

 order, one which is not represented in New Zealand, is 

 called the Cfesalpmepe ; the flowers in this group have the 

 petals nearly similar in size and shape instead of being 

 irregular and butterfly -like, and the stamens are all 

 separate from one another. Now, the kowhai is a sort of 

 link between these groups, for although its affinities 

 are mainly with the Papilionacese, in which group it is 

 placed by systematists, its petals show a considerable 

 departure from the pea-like character, and its ten stamens 

 stand all separate from one another. Whether these 

 are primitive characters, which seems most likely, or 

 reversions due to the mode of fertilisation of the flowers, 

 it is not possible to decide ; but we may safely infer from 

 the wide distribution of the genus Sophora in tropical 

 and sub-tropical regions, as well as from the peculiar 

 characters of the flowers, that it has retained its special 

 features from a long-buried past or, in other words, that 

 it is a very old genus. 



Though conspicuous flowers are almost wanting in July 

 (it would scarcely do to say they were conspicuous by 

 their absence), there are many plants whose inconspicuous 

 flowers are still to be found. Such flowers, of course, are 

 not dependent on insects, but are mostly self - fertilised, 

 or as in the case of so many introduced catkin-bearing 

 species they are fertilised by the wind. Many of the 

 commonest garden weeds sowthistle, groundsel, chick- 

 weed, and others which flower all through the winter 

 with aggravating regularity, are thus self-fertilised. Of 

 native plants, one of those worth looking at is our only 

 species of spurge Euphorbia glauca (referred to at p. 113). 

 It usually flowers later in the season, but may be met with 

 this month. It is a pale-green erect herb, two feet or more 



