248 Transactions.— Botany. 
short pinnules. І have drawn up the following diagnosis of cach, which 
differs slightly from those of ** Synopsis Filicum." 
Cheilanthes tenuifolia, Swartz. 
Rhizome covered with silky scales. Stipes tufted, erect, 4-6" long, wiry, 
polished, purple black, slightly fibrillose at base. Frond 6’-8” long, 37—4” 
broad, deltoid tripinnatifid, glabrous, not coriaceous. Pinne 6 to 12, 
ascending at an acute angle with the main rachis in nearly opposite pairs, or 
alternate. Pinnules deltoid or oblong, contracted, cut down to the rachis in 
deltoid or oblong, entire or irregularly-lobed, or crenate, or rounded segments. 
Rachis narrowly winged above, polished, smooth, glabrous on both surfaces, 
Sori often continuous, covering the back of the pinnule, and projecting beyond 
its margin. Involucre crenate or toothed, l 
Cheilanthes sieberi, Kunze. 
Stipes densely tufted, 2^—6" long, erect and crowded, wiry, polished, brown. 
Frond 3’—9” long, 27-13" broad, narrow-oblong-lanceolate, acuminate, tripin- 
natifid. Pinne in 3 to 15 opposite pairs, lower pairs distant, broadly deltoid, 
7-1” long. Pinnules pinnate at base, not coriaceous. Segments entire, or lobed, 
or crenate, often contracted. Sori scattered, rarely continuous, and never 
projecting beyond the margin of the pinnule. Involucre small, roundish, not 
apparently toothed. 
Art. XLIII.—On the Spread of Cassinia leptophylla, 
By W. T. L. Travers, F.L.S. 
[Read before the Wellington Philosophical Society, 22nd September, 1873.] 
Most persons who have been in the habit of passing over the hills on the 
eastern side of Wellington Harbour, or of visiting the Miramar Peninsula, 
occupied by Mr. Coutts Crawford as a sheep farm, will have noticed the 
increase, during the last few years, of an indigenous shrub commonly known 
by its native name as the Taiwhenu, or sea mat-cord, but known to botanists as 
Cassinia leptophylla. They will, probably, also have observed how much this 
shrub is already interfering with the use of the land referred to for pastoral 
purposes, occupying, as it does in many places, patches of several acres in 
extent, and everywhere preventing, by the rapidity of its growth, the attempts 
of the sheep to make their way through it, or to reach the scanty grass 
growing about it. 
Whilst passing through Queen Charlotte Sound during recent visits to . 
Nelson, I was struck with the very rapid extension of the same plant over all 
the open parts of the hills, and was led to make enquiries in reference to it, as 
