AGATHIS AUSTKALIS. 293 



AGATHIS. 



Salisbury in Trans. Linn. Soc. VIII. 311, t. 15 (1807). Bentham and Hooker, Gen. 

 Plant. III. 436 (1881). Eichler in Engler and Prantl, Nat. Pfl. Fam. 66 (1887). 

 Masters in Journ. Linn. Soc. XXX. 25 (1893). Dammara, Lambert, Genus Pinus, II. t. 6. 

 Endlicher, Synops. Conif. 188. 



A genus of evergreen trees closely allied to Araucaria, and 

 including about ten species that are distributed through the Malay 

 Archipelago, the islands of the south Pacific Ocean, eastern tropical 

 Australia arid New Zealand. Inhabiting only tropical and sub-tropical 

 regions, the species can have no place in the British Pinetum, nor 

 would notice of the genus be taken in this place but for the great 

 importance, in an economic sense, of Agathis australis, the species 

 indigenous to New Zealand, which is one of the best timber and 

 resin-producing trees known. The following description of it and 

 the subjoined particulars are derived wholly from Kirk's " Forest 

 Flora of New Zealand." 



Agathis australis. 



A lofty tree with a straight trunk 80 100 or more feet high, and 

 4 8 feet in diameter, free of branches for the greater part of the 

 height, and when standing alone with a broad spreading head. Bark 

 of trunk thick and very resinous, cinereous-brown, fissured into large 

 flat plates. Branches spreading, somewhat distant, much ramified at 

 the distal end. Leaves persistent several years ; on young trees 

 narrowly lanceolate, acute, 1 -3 inches long, spreading, distant, very 

 thick and coriaceous ; on adult trees oblong or obovate-oblong, close- 

 set, bright lustrous green. Staminate flowers axillary, cylindric, obtuse, 

 1 1*5 inch long ; stamens spirally crowded, with a peltate connective 

 bearing ten twelve pendulous anther cells. Ovuliferous flowers 

 terminal on short lateral branchlets, composed of numerous broadly 

 obovate, imbricated scales each bearing a solitary inverted ovule at the 

 base on the ventral side. Cones globose, about 2 inches in diameter; 

 scales ligneous ; seeds with a small membranous wing. 



Agathis australis, Salisbury in Trans. Linn. Soc. loc. cit. supra. Kirk, Forest 

 Fl. N. Zeal. 143, tt. 7981. 



Dammara australis, Lambert, Genus Pinus, II. t. 6 (1828). London, Arb. et 

 Frut. Brit. IV. 2488, with fig. Hooker fil, Handb. N. Zeal. Fl. 252. Carriers, 

 in Van Houtte's More des Serres, XI. 75, with tig. Parlatore, D. C. Prodr, XVI. 

 376. Gordon, Pinet. ed. II, 108. 



Podocarpus zamisefolia, A. Richard, Fl. N. Zeal. 231. 



N. Zeal, vernacular, Kauri Pine. 



Agathis australis at the present time has but a limited range in 

 New Zealand ; with the exception of a few isolated trees on the 

 west coast, it is confined to the area in the North Island lying 

 between the North Cape and the 38th parallel of south latitude. 

 It usually forms large groves mixed with other trees ; pure forests 

 are rare and of small extent. The superb Kauri forests are, however, 



