190°: General Remarks on’ the High Mountain Vegetation. 
The plant itself consists of a bunched-up mass of close,. erect, stiff but slender 
terete, grooved stems, 30—50 cm High, and more or less purplish-red in colour. 
It is abundant throughout the high mountains of the Central and Southern 
provinces, eneinE to 1500 m and occasionally reaching the lowlands. 2 
. The species of Ourisia (Serophular.). 
Ourisia, a Ban of about 22 species, is confined to Subanlarctic Some 
. America, New Zealand and Tasmania. The New Zealand species number ı1; En 
all are endemic. The three large-leaved species are alone of Pliysiognomis 
importance, though the remainder are floriferous and showy. 2: 
O. macrophylia is especially abundant on the North Island mountains. 
There is a thick, semi-terete, half-buried rhizome by means of which the plant 
is capable of rapid vegetative increase and forms wide colonies. At short 
intervals, leaves are given off from the flanks of the rhizome so closely asto 
touch. The blades are ovate, crenate, rather thick, vivid green above, but 
Ppurplish-red beneath and concave, so that they oe water which finde ie 
way to the rhizome by means of the deeply channelled, stout, fleshy leaf-stalk. x 
The flowers are in about 8 whorls on stout peduncles 25 cm high; each 
measures about 1.6 cm x 2.5 cm, they are white on the lips but citron-yellow 
‚in the corolla-tube. 
OÖ. macrocarpa of the Fiord ek and O. RE a closely allied species, 
or variety, of the central‘ Southern Alps. are ecologically similar in form and 
„habitat to 2 macrophylia, but the Nowers are somewhat larger. 
ei 
SH. Senecio scorzoneroides Hook ‚a ans): 
io: many parts ‘of the wetter high mountains of the Southern Boränich 
province S. scorzoneroides plays as great a part in the floral ‚physiognomy as 
 Ranunculus Lyallii and many hectares of virgin herb-field in the Southern 
Alps may be white with the abundant blossoms of this plant. Not only dor 
it grow in the best soil of the hillside, but, in a more stunted form, it thrives 
“ on IF ock-faces, eonsolidated debris-helds and the wind-swept sour, mountain- 
TL 
‚rosettes from a . stout. root-stock; Khers: are some 15. cm m long, broadiy lanceolate 
ae thick and | glandular-pubescent, The flower heads are in ) 
