502 Transactions.— Botany. 
bined with its high nutritive qualities and hardy habit, it has more than any 
other grass aided the rapid progress of Canterbury and Otago. This and 
the preceding species ought to form part of the armorial bearings of the 
South Island. 
When growing alone it exhibits a remarkably tussocky habit, quite foreign 
to its character in the British Islands, but the tussocks are not nearly so 
rigid as those of Poa australis, var. levis, and they disappear when it is cul- 
tivated with other grasses. It is especially adapted for mixed pasturage on 
rather dry and gravelly soils, and for sheep runs at considerable altitudes, 
but should form part of all ordinary mixed pastures except on moist land. 
Of all grasses, native or introduced, this species and Poa colensoi are the 
most valuable for sheep runs, while their herbage is eaten alike by horses, 
cattle, and sheep. à 
Triticum scabrum, Br. 
Blue Grass. 
This is a valuable and nutritious grass, producing a large yield of herb- 
age, which is everywhere eaten by cattle and horses. Although most 
abundant in the central districts of the Southern Island, it is found from 
the Great Barrier Island to Southland, and ascends from the sea-level to 
6,000 feet. 
It is perhaps less nutritious than the preceding species, with which it is 
often associated, but it affords a much heavier yield per acre, and will grow 
in moister situations. It is preferred by horses and cattle to most other 
kinds, and might be cultivated with great advantage either as a special crop 
for forage purposes, or as forming part of ordinary pasturage. 
In the vallies of the South Island it is evidently increasing to a great 
extent, and in open places often forms large patches of the most luxuriant 
herbage, to the exclusion of other kinds. 
On the Hanmer Plains the slender naked culms of this species some- 
times become elongated and prostrate, attaining the extreme length of five 
or six feet. 
Art. LXXII.—Descriptions of Two New Species of Veronica. 
By T. Kex, F.L.8. 
[Read before the Wellington Philosophical Society, 14th November, 1876.} 
Veronica obovata, n. s. 
Ax erect glabrous shrub, 4-5 feet high, sparingly branched, branches erect, 
when old strongly marked with the scars of fallen leaves. Leaves concave, 
loosely imbricated, erect, 4-1 inch long, narrow, obovate or oblong, 
