604 Transactions. 
C. The Growth-forms and their Relation more especially to the Vertical 
Distribution. 
On account of the constantly high humidity in the lowland forests of 
Westland, the Hymenophyllaceae are there to be found at their optimum 
development. Throughout Westland the epiphytic station is, taking the 
family as a whole, the characteristic one, and a number of the species adopt 
a luxuriant pendulous habit with irregularly elongated fronds. This very 
luxuriance ‘serves to throw into greater prominence two facts—viz., that 
certain thorough-going epiphytes are able to adopt a stunted and imbricated 
frond-form with a mat-like habit of growth, and in this state to flourish 
even in the forest-canopy and in other exposed stations, other epiphytic 
species being quite incapable of doing this; and, secondly, that certain 
terrestrial or low epiphytic species preserve the deltoid form of frond 
unmodified. The growth-form of each species and the extent to which it 
can be modified must thus be regarded as an important factor in the deter- 
mination of its distribution. In the case of some of the species the growth- 
form will restrict the distribution, but with others the ability to modify it 
will act in the opposite direction. 
(a.) The Tufte 
d Croat b. Fo wy 
