- 1923 . 
PREFACE. 
pfj'vv' YO«K 
*0T a M 
The desirability of publishing a compendious account of tbe plants of 
New Zealand having been represented to tbe Colonial Government by 
Dr. Knight, F.L.S., Auditor- General, and other gentlemen interested 
in the Natural History of the Islands, and in the development of their 
resources, that Government was pleased to entrust me with the pre- 
paration of such a work, and to place at my disposal the necessary funds 
for its publication, including a liberal remuneration for my services. I 
was at the same time instructed to make Mr. Bentham’s ‘Hongkong 
Flora ’ my guide as to the form of the work and method of describing 
the plants, and to adhere in these and in all other matters to the plan* 
recommended by Sir W. J. Hooker for publishing in a uniform series 
Floras of all the British Colonies. The title ‘ Handbook of the New 
Zealand Flora’ is adopted in accordance with the wishes of its pro- 
moters. 
Though as complete as the materials at my disposal enable me to 
make this book, it is still imperfect as to the descriptions of several 
Orders of Flowering plants ; whilst with regard to the Flowerless, it is 
tolerably complete in the Orders Ferns and Ly copods only; of the 
others, the islands no doubt possess twice as many Mosses and Junger- 
mannias as have hitherto been discovered ; and I have been able to offer 
but a meagre sketch of the Fungi, of the lower tribes of Algse, and of 
the more minute and especially crustaceous Lichens that grow on rocks 
and on the bark of trees. It must, however, be many years before the 
multitudinous New Zealand genera and species of these very obscure 
and imperfectly-known tribes of plants are fully known, and I have 
thought it best to give good descriptions of all the commoner and most 
conspicuous only, which can be easily found and studied, and to treat 
more generally the rarer and more obscure, of which I have but imper- 
* Sec ‘Natural History Review,’ 1861, p. 255. 
