New Zealand Flora , with a Reply to Criticism, 357 
The falling off from north to south is extremely regular. If we plot 
these figures in a curve we get the result shown in Fig. 6. Both fall off 
from north to south, but the endemics fall off much more rapidly; both have 
maxima and minima at the same points, or practically the same. Nothing 
as yet proposed but age and area will explain such curves as these. The 
wides are older, and have mostly spread so far down New Zealand that their 
curve is nearly flat: the endemics are younger, and have only spread to 
varying distances down the islands, so that their curve rapidly falls off. In 
face of a curve like this one cannot maintain that the wides are killing out 
the endemics. 
Now if these families had arrived in New Zealand by casual transport 
across the sea, it is very difficult to believe that their arrangement would 
Fig. 6. 
have shown such symmetry. It would seem much more probable that 
they arrived at some comparatively narrow point of entry in the north. 
The diagram on p. 442 ( 19 ) gives an idea of what may happen under 
age and area, and shows that the maximum of endemics is to be expected at 
or near the point of entry. In connexion with this diagram, as Dr. Sinnott 
and others say that my whole argument about New Zealand hinges on the 
fact that I commence with an hypothetical entrance of the flora at the centre, 
it may be worth while to point out that the result will be similar wherever 
be the point of entry, the maximum of the endemics always being near to 
that point. Further, it is not absolutely necessary that it be a point of 
entry ; the result would be similar if it were a belt of entry. If, for example, 
the entry were by the whole belt from 300 to 700 miles, above E 2 and 3, 
we should get a zoning 
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