116 FLORA OF TASMANIA. {Onagraria. 
Ovarium 4-loculare, stylo elongato, stigmate clavato. Capsula 4-gona, 4-locularis, loculicide 4-valvis, 
polysperma, valvis membranaceis. Semina ascendentia, ad chalazam apicalem longe comosa. 
More or less pubescent or pilose, rarely glabrous, slender, erect herbs, with woody, perennial, erect or decum- 
bent stems, or with often creeping rhizomes, opposite or alternate leaves, and axillary, rose-coloured or white 
flowers. Calyx-Uihe adnate with the very long, linear, tetragonous ovary, its limb four-cleft, deciduous. Petals 
four. Stamens eight. Style slender, with a clavate, simple or lobed stigma. Capsule four-celled, four-valved ; 
dissepiments opposite the middle of the valves, with numerous seeds attached to the axis ; valves separating from 
the four-winged axis. — Seeds with a crustaceous testa, and a long tuft of silky hairs at the chalaza. (Name from 
€tti, upon, and Xo(3o<s, apod; in allusion to the limb of the calyx surmounting the ovary.) 
A very. extensive European genus, abundant in most temperate climates, and especially so in New Zealand. 
Many of the species have very wide ranges, and are extremely difficult of determination ; characters have been 
sought in all parts of the plants, but none appear very constant, except such as serve to distinguish some of the 
most prominent sections of the genus. Lately, specific marks have been supposed to exist in the microscopic nature 
of the pubescence of the winter leaf-shoots, but such characters can never be available for practical purposes, nor is 
their value susceptible of being accurately estimated, for these shoots vary extremely, according to the mildness and 
humidity of the season, and they are not (like the floral organs) highly developed parts of the plant. For my own 
part I must confess that I have no definite idea of what are species and what not, in the genus ; after a most careful 
study of all the southern forms in a dried state, I am quite unable to pronounce any decided opinion upon any of 
them. In New Zealand, where the genus is more abundant than in any other part of the globe, and covers great 
tracts of countiy, I was quite unable to distinguish the species with any precision, though I studied them most 
carefully in the live state, and at all periods of growth. In Britain too I have paid some attention to the native 
forms, both wild and cultivated, with no better success. In all cases it is very easy to recognize certain forms as 
more constant than others, but the idea that is conceived of a species in the wild state, in so variable a genus, is 
modified extremely by, and perhaps wholly depends upon, the character it assumes in the locality wherein it is most 
examined ; just as our ideas of a species, when drawn from the collections of others, are founded upon the majority 
of the specimens they send. In the 'Flora Antarctica' I have stated that there are in Tasmania plants exactly 
resembling the European E. alpimm,; I have not however included that species in the Tasmanian flora, as I believe 
the specimens alluded to are only small states of E. glabellimi, wholly undistinguishable however from E. alpinum. 
In the present unsatisfactory state of our systematic knowledge of the genus it is unsafe to speculate upon the 
significance of such a fact as this ; it is but one of a great class which will, in my opinion, when properly worked 
out and made as prominent as they should be, lead to a very different and much more satisfactory view of specific 
botany than what is usually entertained. 
In the descriptions of the species here given, the characters are all relative only, and not absolute. In no 
species are the leaves always and uniformly opposite, or always glabrous or haiiy, and so on ; it is almost hope- 
less for any one who has not all or the majority of the Tasmanian species to compare together, to make out an 
isolated specimen by the descriptions. The characters differ a little from those given to the same species in the 
New Zealand Flora, as I have thought it best to describe here the prevalent Tasmanian forms only. 
a. Stems creeping. Flowers axillary. Peduncle* of the fruit erect, slender, much longer than the leaves. 
1. Epilobium tenuipes (Nob. in Fl. N. Zeal. i. 59) ; pusillum, caulibus brevibus e basi repente 
decumbentibus bifariam pubescentibus, foliis confertis oppositis sessilibus anguste lineari-oblongis obscure 
dentatis coriaceis glaberrimis, pedunculis fructiferis gracilibus strictis capsula glabrata longioribus. (Gunn, 
1066, 2028.) 
Hab. Abundant on the summit of Mount Olympus, forming large patches ; Isis River, Middlesex 
Plains, Ghm».~- (FL Jan.) 
Distrib. New Zealand. 
