HIGHLAND PLANTS FROM NEW GUINEA. 43 
but from what we have now seen, it promises to be eminently interesting. On this 
occasion I shall merely group these highland-plants on geographic principles, with a 
hope that it may yet fall to my own share, to carry on these comparisons more amply 
at some future time from fuller material, the total subalpine and alpine flora of New 
Guinea in all likelihood comprising several hundred species of vascular plants. Such 
future researches will be to myself all the more fascinating, as from 1853 to 1855 the 
whole flora of the Australian Alps became elucidated by field-work of my own, it being 
utterly unknown before. In these pages is alluded only to those plants, which Sir 
Wiliam MacGregor gathered in altitudes between 8000 and 13,000 feet, therefore in 
the region above the mountain-zone, involved in almost permanent clouds. 
Of the 80 plants, specifically and distinctly recorded in these pages as emanating 
from the most elevated regions, nearly half the number seems endemic, so far as 
hitherto can be judged, while not yet all the highlands of South-eastern Asia are 
explored, and while we yet remain in uncertainty about the constancy of some of the 
characteristics, on which the adopted new specific forms are systematically established. 
Of these restricted Papuan plants two, namely Ischnea elachoglossa and Decatoca 
Spenceri, represent new genera, the one allied to the exclusively Italian Nananthea, 
the other to the Australian and chiefly alpine Trochocarpa. Of the other endemic 
plants 17 are of Himalayan tpyes, namely Hypericum Macegregorii, Sagina donatioides, 
Rubus Macgregori, Anaphalis Mariae, Myriactis bellidiformis, Vaccinium parvuli- 
folium, V. amblyandrum, V. Helenae, V. Macbainii, Gaultiera mundula, Rhododendron 
eracilentum, R. spondylophyllum, R. culminicolum, R. phaeochiton, Gentiana 
Ettinghausenii, Trigonotis Haackei and T. oblita, though some of these show also a 
touch of the Sundaic vegetative element; and here at once may be alluded to the 
extensive display of ericaceous (inclusive of vacciniaceous) plants, which forms of 
vegetation are in Australia so very scantily developed, and then only in alpine regions. 
Contrarily however we now perceive otherwise almost a preponderance of upland 
Australian or New Zealandian or sub-antarctic types in the highlands vegetation of 
New Guinea, so far as already revealed; this is demonstrated by the endemic. 
occurrence of Ranunculus amerophyllus, Metrosideros Regelu, Rubus diclinis, Olearia 
Kernotii, Vittadinia Alinae, V. macra, Veronica Lendenfeldii, Libocedrus Papuana, 
Phyllocladus hypophyllus, Schoenus curvulus and Festuca oreobaloides ; furthermore 
this repetition of the features of the southern flora so far north is rendered still more 
expressive and significant by the occurrence of numerous plants absolutely identical 
with our southern species, namely: Hpilobium pedunculare, Galium australe, 
Lagenophora Billardiérii, Styphelia montana, Kuphrasia Brownii, Myosotis australis, 
Sisyrinchium pulchellum, Astelia alpina, Carpha alpina, Carex fissilis, Uncinia 
riparia, U. Hookerii, Agrostis montana, Danthonia, penicillata, Festuca pusilla, 
Lycopodium scariosum, Gleichenia dicarpa and Dawsonia superba—most of these 
being now shown for the first time to approach so near to the equator. four Borneo- 
plants, hitherto only known from lofty altitudes of Kini-Balu, have now been traced 
