LAKE WAKATIPU 
473 
forcing one’s self through the thickets was of course intensified 
when the Bush Lawyer (. Rubus australis, Eorst.) intervened with his 
many tangling points of argument. Painful experience makes me 
consider our British Bramble a more deadly foe than the New 
Zealander. Its prickles are longer and more viciously curved. 
On the other hand our Bramble is an open fighter, and one 
need not accept his challenge. The Bush Lawyer, however, is 
stealthy and underhand in his line of action, preferring ambuscade 
to front attack, and he wears a sweetly innocent-looking face 
that seduces the unwary new chum. When fern and bramble 
found allies in hidden rocks a fall often resulted, and the tired 
entomologist after extricating himself and recovering his feet had to 
disentangle his net from the clutches of the Lawyer with such patience 
as he might haply have left. It is not surprising that a morning so 
spent added no new species to our list. Another terror of that hillside 
—and indeed of the whole district—was the Piripiri ( Acaena sanguis - 
orbae, Vahl, Nat. Ord. Rosaceae), commonly known as the “bid-a- 
bid,” a most innocent-looking plant which is, however, so prolific of 
burrs that a large portion of one’s time was spent in picking them 
off the net. Later in the day I captured in the Domain—here 
a civilized park, not a bush reserve—a specimen of the cosmopolitan 
Zinchenia fascialis, Cram. 
Mr. Howes found a few Snails that morning, and gave to Mrs. 
Longstaff a specimen of *Laoma celia, Hutton, one of Allodiscus 
mossi, Murdoch; as well as three *Janella papillata, Hutton, besides 
Agriolimax agrestis. 
In the afternoon Mrs. Longstaff dredged in the shallow parts of 
the lake for Water Snails. The bottom was in places black with 
* Potamopyrgus badia, Gould, both the smooth and the spiny forms 
occurring together. It is said that numbers of this mollusc are 
found in the stomachs of the Trout. But whatever effect the intro¬ 
duction of those voracious fishes may have had upon the fresh-water 
fauna of New Zealand, it does not seem probable that the Potamo¬ 
pyrgus will be soon exterminated. The only other shells met with 
were * Isidora lyrata, Woods; * Diplodon (Unio) menziesi, Gray; 
* Pisidium novae-zealandiae, Prime; and * Sphaerium novae - 
zealandiae , Deshayes. 
Mr. Howes, a month before our visit, had left a cyanide-bottle 
with Mr. T. E. Haines, a very intelligent Queenstown tradesman, 
who had preserved therein quite a number of moths which had visited 
the lights of his shop. The most numerous among them were 
* Asaphodes abrogata ; the most notable * Morrisonia phricias, 
