89 



slender villous stem. Calyx lobes, oblong, obtuse, villous. Styles, subulate, 

 tips hooked, villous at bottom, with long hairs. 



Allied to Geum parviflorum, and distinguished by the large single flower, 

 orange pencils of hairs on the crenatures, and minute single pair of leaflets. 

 Habitat, mountains of Nelson, 3000-4000 feet alt. Collected by Mr. H. H. 

 Travers. 



Senecio laxifolia, Buchanan, n. sp. 



A woody shrub. Branches, petioles, leaves below, and inflorescence, 

 covered with huffish-white tomentum. Leaves with slender petioles, 

 |~ l 1 - inches long, blade, 1-2-J- inches long, narrow, oblong, tapering, acute at 

 both ends, flat, crenate or obscurely crenate, finely reticulated above, and with 

 flocculent tomentum on the midrib, slightly coriaceous. Corymbs, very open, 

 on long slender peduncles, 3-7 inches long, with a few narrow, linear leaves, 

 ^— f inch long. Heads, broad cylindric, ^-finchdia., rays, J inch long, revolute, 

 pappus hair, white, scabrid ; achene, grooved, glabrous. 



Allied to Senecio Monroi, but easily distinguished from it by its habit, 

 larger flat acute leaves, which are never wrinkled on the margins, long 

 peduncled corymbs, lai'ger flowers, and absence of glandular pubescence on the 

 involucre and pedicels. Habitat, mountains of Nelson, 3000—5000 feet alt. 

 Collected by Mr. H. H. Travers. 



Art. XV. — On the Botany of the Thames Gold-fields. By T. Kirk. 



[Read before the Wellington Philosophical Society, November 13, 1869.] 



The country between the Waikawa and Kawaeranga creeks consists, for the 

 most part, of steep hills and narrow gullies, and presents but few variations in 

 those features which influence the character of its vegetation. From the 

 Kawaeranga northward to Kurunui, a gradually-narrowing strip of alluvial 

 land, much of which is now occupied by Shorthand and Grahamstown, still 

 exhibits dense thickets of Olearia Solandri, Hook, f., Plagianthus divaricatus, 

 Forst., Muhlenbeckia adpressa, Lab., M. compressa, Mein., Ooprosma sps., 

 Dodoncea viscosa, Forst., with a close undergrowth of sedges and other uliginal 

 plants, the most conspicuous of which is Cladium junceum, Br., often found 

 covering large spaces, to the exclusion of other plants. The mud-flats and 

 margins of the creeks are occupied by the Mangrove, Avicennia officinalis, L., 

 which is here abundant and attains a large size, Chenopodium ambiguum, Br., 

 Leptocarpus simplex, A. Rich, Selliera radicans, Cav., Samolus repens, Pers., 

 /Scirpus maritimus, L., and rarely S. triqueter. L. 



At various points along the coast, small patches of sand admit of a sparse 

 growth of arenarian plants, the most common being Convolvulus Soldanella, L., 

 and Carex pumila, Thumb. ; the Pingao {Desmochoenus spiralis, Hook.), a plant 

 which, in the north, at least, is common on shifting sand, usually within the 

 influence of the sea-spray, is here found only in small quantity and apparently 

 confined to a single locality. Occasionally, as in the neighbourhood of the 

 Tararu, the Waionau, and other creeks, alluvial flats of sufficient extent to 

 have been used as cultivations by the Maoris, are now more or less clothed 

 with a dense growth of Tauhinu (P omaderris phylicifolia, Lodd.), Manuka 

 [Leptospermum scoparium, Forst.), Koromiko (Veronica salicifolia, Forst.), 

 and fern (Pteris esculenta, Forst.), with an abundance of naturalized plants, 

 waifs of cultivation, grasses, and other stragglers, which are again mixed with 

 a few coarse-growing native plants of herbaceous habit. 



