326 'Transactions. — Botany. 



I should also inform you that several of the plants I have now described 

 in my present paper, and also bring specimens of, to show you this 

 evening, were not first detected by me during this past year. A few have 

 been long known to me ; others I first knew of two or three years ago, but 

 wanted time to examine them and work them up. Of others I required 

 better or more complete specimens, while, for a few, I am wholly indebted 

 to my botanical friends. 



Still I have been very fortunate during the past year. I have spent a 

 much longer time in patient research in our woods, and deep-secluded glens, 

 and quiet far-off hill-tops and sides, both in winter and in summer, in frost 

 and in heat ; and nature has bounteously rewarded her patient plodding 

 disciple and faithful follower, as she always does all such who serve her 

 heartily and simply, and not for pecuniary gain. 



Among the principal or first-class prizes with which I have been 

 honoured, and which I wish to bring prominently to your notice, are a 

 handsome white-flowering standard Metrosideros, a curious small-leaved 

 Panax, a large-leaved Tupeia, and a fine Fagus ; 4 Orchids (one being a new 

 and rare Bolbophyllum, two others of the beautiful gem-like genus Cory- 

 santhes, and one a very fine and handsome Thelymitra) ; of Liliacea, a 

 Dianella, and an Astelia (the male flower — another single specimen — of the one 

 female flower I discovered three years ago) ; and a few of Cyperaceee, among 

 them a most peculiar Carex, having slender trailing culms more than two 

 yards long. Of Cryptogams a few ferns, among them a neat little Polypodium 

 and a pretty Lindsaa, which latter will serve to fill up a gap or natural 

 sequence in our known species ; several other curious Hepatica, besides the 

 Symphyogyna already mentioned, particularly of the genera Petalophyllum, 

 Aneura, Fimbriaria, and Anthoceros ; a handsome Lichen, giving another 

 distinct species to a small natural genus ; and a few highly curious Fungi. 



Specimens of all of them, both dry and in spirits, some of them being 



also mounted on cardboard, will be severally laid before you ; and may you 



all have as much pleasure in going over and examining them as I have had, 



over and over, in the finding and gathering, examining and describing them. 



Class I. Dicotyledons. 



Order IV.* VIOLABIEiE. 



Genus I. Viola, Linn. 



Viola perexigua, sp. nov. 



A very small tufted perennial herb, its crown of leaves and flowers 

 springing from a thick woody root having many fine and long fibres, with- 

 out branches or stolons. Leaves, 8-12, broadly cordate-orbicular, £— | 

 inch long, glabrous, regularly and deeply crenate, obtuse and rounded at 



* The numbers in this paper attached to both Orders and Genera are those of the 

 " Handbook of the New Zealand Flora." 



