Oheeseman. — On the Fertilization of Thelymitra. 291 



Dracophylhim kirkii, Berggr. 



Shrubby ; leaves patent, fascicled, with a sheathing base, dilated from 

 above, not auricled, narrowed, broadly concave, truncate or mucronate at 

 the apex, glaucous above, striate below ; flowers sohtary, shortly pedicelled, 

 2-3-bracteate, bracts and sepals ovate, acuminate, ciliated on the margins, 

 filaments longer than the anthers, fastened all the way below the middle. 



I wrongly referred {I.e. tab. IV., fig. 1-11) this plant io D . uniflorum, 

 Hook f. It is distinguished from all the other species of this genus with 

 solitary flowers by the shape of the leaves, which are almost canaliculate, 

 and like the leaves of those species which have compound inflorescence, 

 especially D. strictum. The relative length of the anthers and filaments, as 

 well as the pohit of insertion of the stamens, presents some difference in 

 this species from both divisions of the genus. 



Mount Torlesse, in Canterbmy Alps. 



Carex buclianani, Berggr. 



Eeddish-brown ; culms csespitose, graceful, strong, leaves subequal to 

 the culm or longer, tenacious, semiterete, scabrid on the margin ; bracts 

 exceeding the culm, the lower sheathing, the upper not sheathing ; spikes 

 5-6, oblong, the lowest distant from the others which are approximate, 

 the terminal one cylindrical male, the rest female or male at the very base, 

 scales obovate, at length hispido-cuspidate, pale, membraneous, torn at the 

 margin, perigynia elliptical, plano-convex, beaked, beak bifid, and with its 

 upper margin ciliated, serrate, purple- spotted, nerveless, glabrous, covered 

 by the scale, stigmas 2. (C tenax, Berggr., I.e. tab. VII., fig. 1-7 — a name 

 already used for another species). 



Distinguished from C. raoulii, Boott, by the very tenacious semiterete 

 leaves, the terminal spikelet without female flowers, and the nerveless 

 glabrous utricle. 



Aet. XXXVI. — On the Fertilization of Thelymitra. 

 By T. F. Cheeseman, F.L.S. 

 [Read before the Auckland Institute, 21st June, 1880.] 

 That cross-fertiHzation is the almost universal rule in the great family of 

 Orchids is a generahzation first propoiinded and sustained by reliable evi- 

 dence by Mr. Darwin, in his " Fertilization of Orchids." Many memoirs 

 and short papers on the subject have appeared since the pubhcation of the 

 first edition of this work in 1862, but, taking them collectively, they only 

 give additional confirmation to Mr. Darwin's views. It is true that, to the 



