DRACOPHYLLUM LONGIFOLIUM, Kk. Brown. 
THE INAKA. 
OrpErR—E PACRIDEA. 
(Plate CIX,) 
To see this singular plant in its most characteristic form it is necessary to visit 
Stewart Island or the Auckland Islands, for, although it is not uncommon in 
the mountains of the South Island, it is rarely more than a few feet high, with 
short erect leaves, but on Stewart Island it often forms a tree 35ft. high, with 
erass-like leaves nearly a foot in length. Mr. Charles Traill informs me that it 
is termed “ inaka” by the Maoris on Stewart Island: it is one of several trees 
termed “ grass-tree’’ by the settlers in the South Island. 
This species was discovered in Dusky Bay by Forster durine Cook’s second 
voyage, and was described under the name of Epacris longifolia. It was referred 
to Dracophyllum by Robert Brown, and appears under that name in the ‘f Flora 
Antarctica.”’ A form with short leaves, triquetrous in the upper part, was 
described by Sir Joseph Hooker in ‘ Flora Nove-Zelandia ’’ under the name 
of D. Lyallii, but referred to this species in the “ Handbook of the New Zealand 
Flora.” 
It forms an erect shrub or small tree, from 3ft. to 30ft. high, with a trunk 
rarely exceeding rft. in diameter, clothed with black fibrous bark. The branches 
are slender, erect, and naked below, the leaves being restricted to the upper 
portion, so that the plant often presents a curious tufted appearance. The 
leaves are from 3in. to 1oin. long, and of singular form: for about in. from the 
base they are expanded into a membranous sheath, which is nearly as broad as it 
is long, and abruptly narrowed into the long narrow blade, which is from 4in. to 
lin. broad where it joins the sheath, and gradually tapers to a point, so that 
leaf and blade resemble a spade with a long tapering stock. The blade is 
concave on the upper surface, convex or faintly erooved on the lower. The upper 
surface of young leaves is usually pubescent, and the margins are fringed or 
ciliated, but this character is evanescent: the leaves are close-set near the 
tips of the branches, the sheathing bases overlapping each other: on young 
plants the leaves are often soft and curved downwards. The flowers are small, 
and crowded in racemes, which spring from the tips of very short branchlets. 
The racemes are from lin. to 2in. long, and are composed of from eight to 
fourteen flowers: each flower has a large brown bract at its base, and its 
pedicel is clothed with green, overlapping, fringed bracts, which nearly hide the 
corolla. The calyx is deeply cleft into five broad lobes, which equal or shghtly 
exceed the corolla in length. The corolla is entire, with five short lobes, which 
are slightly turned inwards at the points, and five stamens with extremely short 
filaments are inserted considerably below its mouth. The ovary is usually five- 
celled, with a short straight style, and the fruit is a five-celled capsule, with 
numerous minute seeds. 
The flowers are developed from October to December. 
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