252 Transactions. — Botany. 



Hah. Epiphytical on high trees in forests, Seventy-mile Bush, between 

 Norsewood and Danneverke, County of Waipawa; 1884: W.C. Flowering 

 in January. 



Obs. A very peculiar, fine and distinct species ; of which, from its 

 growing so very high up in the trees, it is difficult to obtain good 

 specimens. 



2. Astelia albicans, sp. nov. 



Leaves linear-acuminate, 1 foot 3 inches to 2 feet 6 inches long, f inch 

 wide at broadest part, tips much drawn out, obtuse and hairy, drooping, 

 stout, glabrous and green above, closely appressed with short white hairs 

 below mixed with minute dark green dots, sub-8-nerved, edges ciliate, 

 slightly keeled, of a blackish colour for about three inches from base ; base 

 thick, dilated, \\ inches wide, satiny within and densely shaggy on outside 

 with long white hairs. Male, scape flexuous, erect or slightly cernuous, 4 

 inches long, very stout, obtusely triquetrous, densely silky ; panicle short, 

 stout, 6-8 inches long, composed of 6 stout short obtuse sub-sessile 

 spikes, each 2 inches long and 1 inch wide, with a broadly ovate and very 

 acuminate bract at the base of each spike, the lowermost bract 1 foot long ; 

 perianths sessile, densely crowded, white, f inch long, with a single very 

 narrow linear-acuminate light brown bracteole at base, shorter than segments 

 of perianth ; segments cut to base, glabrous, shaggy at bases, distant, 6-7 

 lines long, longer than anthers, narrow-linear- acuminate, very membranous, 

 transparent, obsoletely 3-nerved, at first erect, afterwards wholly reflexed ; 

 filaments 3 lines long, white, very stout, broad and red at base, tapering, 

 arising from bases of segments ; anthers 2-2^ lines long, linear-acuminate, 

 hastate, light brown ; stigma plumose, sessile on a beak-like projection of 

 disk. Female scape much smaller and more slender than male, slightly 

 drooping ; panicle composed of 4 (sometimes 5) rather distant racemes, each 

 2-2-| inches long, % inch wide ; bracts same as in male but narrower ; 

 perianths free, shortly pedicelled, closely enclosing ovary below ; segments 

 cut half-way to base, very small, reflexed, with here and there minute 

 rudimentary anthers ; stigma sessile, somewhat trifid, papillose ; ovary 

 ovate-acuminate, cylindrical, glabrous, greenish-yellow. 



Hab. Epiphytical on trees, east slopes of Euahine mountain range, 

 County of Waipawa; January, 1884 : Mr. A. Hamilton. 



3. Astelia fragrans, Col.* (Fruit). 



Fruit large globular, orange- coloured with puckered sub-angled red tips 

 (stigmatic points) ; calyx persistent, 6-lobed, large, free, thickened, saucer - 



* See " Trans. N.Z. Inst.," vol. xv., p. 333, for a full description of this species f 

 •without its fruit. 



