POSTSCRIPT. 
The circumstances which led to this publication, and the general plan of the work, have already been mentioned 
in the preface that appeared with the first fasciculus which was issued in. June, 1877, containing twenty plates. 
A second portion of the work, with twenty-two plates, was issued in June, 1879; and now, after the lapse of 
another year, the third part, containing twenty-one plates, is presented to the public, and concludes the work. 
The complete work thus contains sixty-four instead of fifty-five plates as originally contemplated, the extra 
number being required to include new species of grasses that have been discovered during the period that has 
been occupied in preparing this volume. These extra plates and the accompanying letter-press have been 
numbered in a manner that will allow of their being found in their proper systematic position in the volume. 
The total number of species of grasses which are in this work considered to be indigenous to New Zealand, 
or to have been introduced previous to the first botanical exploration of the country, is eighty-seven, and, of each 
of these, natural-sized figures with descriptive letter-press are now given. 
While the work has been in the Press the seventh volume of Bentham and Mueller’s “ Flora Australiensis ” 
has been received, in which the grasses of Australia are described, and this work contains a few changes in 
nomenclature which are unimportant, in so far as they affect the grasses which are found to occur both in 
Australia and New Zealand. It has been possible only in a few instances to adopt these changes in the present 
work, as in most cases the plates and descriptions of species under their previously-accepted names had already 
been printed off. To the practical agriculturist, for whose assistance this work is chiefly designed, the alteration 
of the scientific names is of comparatively little importance ; but, in order to enable botanists to refer to the 
above-mentioned work, a list of the recent alterations in the nomenclature is appended. 
JAMES HECTOR, 
Wellington, June, 1880. 
Director. 
