Summary of Fesults.] SUBANTARCTIC ISLANDS OF NEW ZEALAND. 797 



foliosa, &c,, are common to Macqiiarie Island and Auckland or Campbell Islands : 

 so that there is considerable evidence for assuming that Macquarie Island once 

 formed part of the New Zealand continent. Further corroborative evidence is 

 derived from the former existence on the island of a land-rail {Hypotaenidia mac- 

 quariensis), and of a parrakeet {Cyanorhampus erythrotis) which is found also on the 

 Antipodes ; the latter, moreover, does not seem able to fly far. 



The existence of certain plants and animals in New Zealand which are identical 

 with or closely allied to others in South America and islands adjacent thereto was 

 long ago referred to by Hutton (1S84 and 1885) and Wallace (1902), and has been 

 more recently dealt with by Benham (1902) and Cockayne (1904), who have shown 

 that, particularly in the islands to the south of New Zealand, there is an element 

 common to other subantarctic lands. Many additional facts bearing on this question 

 will be found in the reports that constitute this work. It will be best to deal first 

 with the terrestrial forms, since these are naturally the most important from the 

 point of view of geographical distributioUc 



As regards the plants, Mr. Cheeseman gives a most complete and exhaustive 

 analysis of the flora of these islands (pp. 453-471), and of the points that it has in 

 common with those of Fuegia and of the Kerguelen - South Georgia region ; and to 

 this he adds a full discussion of the causes that may be considered to account for 

 it. For full details reference should be made to his paper ; but it may be stated 

 here that, out of the thirty-seven flowering-plants and ferns in the Kerguelen and 

 South Georgia groups of islands, twenty — i.e., 54-1 per cent. — are found in the sub- 

 antarctic islands of New Zealand, while twenty-seven are found in Fuegia and 

 the Falkland Islands. The total number of Fuegian plants found in the subant- 

 arctic islands of New Zealand is twenty-nine, fourteen of these extending also to 

 the Kerguelen and South Georgia groups of islands. These figures deal only with 

 specific identity ; if we consider the genera, we find that out of eighty-eight genera 

 found in the subantarctic islands of New Zealand there are no less than fifty-six with 

 representatives in Fuegia. There appears, then, to a be a large element common 

 to the floras of Fuegia and of the subantarctic islands of New Zealand, Against 

 this, however, Mr. Cheeseman points out many important differences between the 

 flora of Fuegia and that of New Zealand — e.g., the presence in Fuegia of thirteen 

 families not found in New Zealand ; twice that number of families represented in 

 New Zealand but not in Fuegia proper ; the differences in the Compositae, &c. (see 

 p. 460).* 



It is worth noting that eleven species of plants found in the subantarctic islands 

 of New Zealand are also found either in the Tristan da Cunha group in the South 

 Atlantic or in the Amsterdam Island group in the Indian Ocean, the flora of 

 these two groups possessing many points of agreement notwithstanding their wide 

 separation, and showing also undoubted traces of affinity with those of Fuegia and 

 Kerguelen. Two of these eleven species, however, do not occur in Fuegia or the 

 Kerguelen - South Georgia group of islands. 



* The relations between the floras of Tierra del Fuego and New Zealand were very fully discussed 

 by the late Nicholas Alboff in his " Flore Raisonnee de la Terre de Feu," written in 1897, though not 

 published till 1902, three years after the death o£ the author. 



