872 Transactions. — Botany. 



ing another and distinct species, inasmuch as it varies considerably from 

 those northern plants (D. media and D. caudata, of Dr. Hooker's "Hand- 

 book "), and does not agree with their separately-published specific 

 characters. It is much the finest of all our New Zealand varieties or 

 species Doodia. I shall, however, in a separate paper* give a description of 

 this plant, D. squarrosa, mihi. 



9. Asplenium flabellifolmm. I have formerly gathered fine specimens of 

 this elegant little ferm among herbage in gravelly spots ; even now it is to 

 found in cliffy nooks on the west side of the " island," 



10. Asplenium obtusatum. This common sea-side fern grew on the cliffs 

 near to the Bluff, on its north-east side. 



11. Aspidium richardi.- — This plant grew sparingly in fine tufts on the 

 hill-sides among the common fern. I removed some plants into my garden 

 a few years back, where they have grown very well. 



12. Polypodium billardieri. — I have found this below at the base of the 

 hill, growing well on, and among old drifted wood, above high water-mark, 

 spring and flood tides, where it had become established. 



13. Polypodium serpens. — This fern formerly grew in the groove or 

 thicket of karaka trees f Corynocarpus Icevigata), which stood near the south 

 end of the "island." I think that grove was originally a tabooed spot 

 (probably a burial-place) of the old aborigines, who formerly dwelt here. 

 On my arrival in 1843, and long after, the cormorants (Graciilus varius) 

 both roosted and built their nests thickly in those trees, so that the spot 

 had the appearance of a small rookery. It was both a pleasing and a 

 curious sight to see them attending assiduously to their young in the breed- 

 ing season, the white breasts and bellies of the parent-birds contrasting so 

 strongly with the dense dark green foliage of the trees. Very soon after 

 the purchase, by the Government, of this block of land the few early white 

 residents (and especially the military) cut down the whole grove ! and also 



two species — Niphoholus bicolor, and Doodia caudata — mil have to be deducted, as I 

 believe these will be found to be merely varieties of N. rupestris and of D. aspera." At 

 that time I did not know the true Doodia aspera, vrhich was then, on the authority of the 

 two brothers Cunningham, and of the French botanist, A. Eichard, all of whom had 

 " gathered the plant in New Zealand," said to be a New Zealand fern, but which is now 

 considered an endemic Australian one. Nearly twelve years after my publication, Sir 

 W. J. Hooker, in his " Species Filicum," when writing on D. aspera, says : — " Our 

 herbarium, though eminently rich in New Zealand plants (including Sir J. D. Hooker's 

 collections formed there, mainly too in the same spot where those three botanists 

 had formerly collected, viz., the Bay of Islands), does not possess a single specimen of 

 D. aspera from that country ; and I am hence led to believe that all writers on the 

 botany of New Zealand have mistaken a state of D. media for it." — L.C., Vol. HI., p. 72. 

 * See paper " On some new and undescribed ferns " (Art. XLIX.) 



