324 Transactions. — Botany. 



nating point, from the southern portion. I believe that a depression of fifty 

 or sixty feet would suffice to restore this strait, and part Stewart Island once 

 more into two. At the head of the inlet the sand-hills present a very re- 

 markable appearance, forming parallel chains that run for two or three 

 miles in straight or nearly straight lines at considerable distances from one 

 another. Their singular arrangement is not easy to explain, but it may be 

 due to the fact that the direction of the prevailing winds, and of the tidal 

 flow through the former strait, would be east and west. Though the sand- 

 hills are evidently of recent origin, they are everywhere covered by About 

 six inches of sandy mould, and overgrown by fern, heath, gravels, rushes, 

 and manuka. 



With the exception of the akeady-mentioned flat areas, there is no grass- 

 covered land in the neighbourhood of Paterson's Inlet. Even in these the 

 grass is very sparse, except in a few patches of no great extent, and it is 

 mixed with a very copious growth of manuka, ferns, (Pteris, Gleichenia, 

 LindscBU, and Schizea), Carpha, CalorojjMts, Cladium, and Lepidosperma. In 

 the boggy parts, which occupy by far the largest portion of the low land, a 

 curious assemblage of alpine plants is found, comprising Ale23ijrum, Oreo- 

 bolus, Donatia, Helophylliim, Liparophyllum, and Actinotus (HemipMies). 



The Liparophyllum., probably L. gmuiii (hitherto known only from Tas- 

 mania), is extremely abundant in the wettest parts, and forms a strong tm"f, 

 held together by its matted and branched root-stocks. It bore abundant 

 fruit, though the latter was scarcely ripe at the time of our visit. 



The plant which I have named Actinotus ( Hemiphues) novcB-zealandi(B 

 belongs to a genus hitherto found only in the alpine parts of Tasmania 

 and Australia. It grows abundantly side by side with Liparophyllum, but 

 affects somewhat drier situations. The genus Actinotus (Hemiphues), which 

 includes this new addition to the flora of New Zealand, belongs to a section 

 of the great natural order of the Umbelliferae. It differs very widely from 

 every other genus of that order, and occupies a singularly isolated position. 

 Instead of having two similar mericarps, like the rest of the Umbelliferge, 

 Dr. Hooker tells us that one of the mericarps appears as if wholly sup- 

 pressed, but his dissections have satisfied him that it is not really suppressed, 

 but "is entu-ely incorporated with the others, and its cavity obliterated." 

 I had the good fortune some three years ago to discover on Stewart 

 Island both Liparopjhyllum and Actinotus (Hemiphues ) , but I was not at the 

 time able to identify them. Some months before this excursion was under- 

 taken, Mr. Kirk, F.L.S., of Wellington, pointed out to me the close 

 resemblance the one bore to the Liparophyllum of Tasmania. The Actviotus 

 (Hemiphues) we are able to identify from the structure of the fruit, and of a 

 withered flower found at Port Pegasus, It seems to me probable that 



