QorENso.—On a Collection of Ferns. 311 
ArT. XXXIX.—On the large Number of Species of Ferns noticed in a small 
Area in the New Zealand Forests, in the Seventy-mile Bush, between Norse- 
wood and Danneverke, in the Provincial District of Hawkes Bay. By. 
Cotenso, F.L.8. 
[Read before the Hawke's Bay Philosophical Institute, 8th May, 1882.] 
Our adopted country, the colony of New Zealand, has long borne a great 
name for its Ferns, owing, perhaps, as much to their being everywhere so 
common (exclusive of the ubiquitous brake fern, Pieris esculenta), from 
the lowest level on the sea-shore, its rocks and cliffs, up to nearly the 
highest point of vegetation on the alpine ranges,—as to their large number 
of genera or of species; although the surpassing beauty and novelty of 
some of them have justly served to raise their fame. In respect to their 
number of species, New Zealand is very far ahead of our British Islands, 
which only contain 48 species of true ferns; but then this truly natural 
order is but poorly represented in Europe. On the other hand, the neigh- 
uring larger Australian colonies contain nearly twice the number of 
species hitherto found in this colony. In their natural state, the open 
plains and hills of New Zealand were almost everywhere covered with the 
common rusty-looking Pteris esculenta; and the woods were filled with 
numerous species and genera, not merely terrestrial, growing on the ground 
like other plants, and including several fine and famed arborescent species 
(commonly called tree-ferns), but also a good number of epiphytical ones, 
only found growing on trees, and then only in the deepest umbrageous and 
damp recesses of the forest; there, alike protected from winds and heat, 
and unvisited by animal ravagers in the shape of cattle, they flourished in 
charming profusion 
According to Dr. Sir Jos. Hooker's ‘‘ Handbook of the New Zealand 
Flora,” there were, at the time of its publication (in 1864), 120 species of 
ferns (exclusive of varieties) found in New Zealand, belonging to 31 genera. 
Of those 120 species, 5 should be deducted, as having been only hitherto 
detected in the off-lying islets in what is called the New Zealand botanical 
region, viz., the Auckland, Campbell’s, Lord Howe's, and Kermadec Islands ; 
thus leaving 115 species described in the ** Handbook” as pertaining to 
New Zealand proper. 
During the last few years I have eda a practice of visiting the woods: 
and forests of this district several times in the year, and on each visit have 
become more and more impressed with the almost unlimited resources of 
bountiful Nature—especially in her botanical productions, and particularly 
in what is called her lower forms, viz., of Cryptogams. It would require a 
series of papers, and that from far abler pens than mine, to give a mere list 
