Hypoxis. | AMARYLLIDACEAE. O27 
flexuous, grooved down the inner face, base widened into a scarious sheath. 
Scapes shorter than the leaves, 1-3-flowered. Flowers small, din. diam. 
Perianth-segments ovate-lanceolate, acute. Stamens short, not 4 as long 
as the perianth-segments; anthers linear, basified. Stigmas lanceolate, 
free. Capsule globose, }in. diam.—Hando. N.Z. Fl. (1864) 275; Benth. 
Fl. Austral. vi (1873) 449; Cheesem. Man. N.Z. Fl. (1906) 7Ol. 
H. hygrometrica Hook. f. Fl. Nov. Zel. i (1853) 253 (not of R. Br.). 
Nortu Isnanp: Hawke’s Bay—Colenso. SoutTH ISLAND: Marlborough—Sandy 
ground near the mouth of the Wairau River, J. H. Macmahon!  Canterbury— 
Banks Peninsula, H. H. Travers, J. B. Armstrong! Cockayne ! Canterbury Plains, 
J. B. Armstrong ! November—April. 
Probably not uncommon on the eastern side of the South Island, but very easily 
overlooked. Also a native of Victoria and Tasmania. 
Family XXI. IRIDACEAE. 
Perennial herbs, with a tuberous or bulbous or creeping rhizome. Leaves 
ustially all radical, narrow, equitant and distichous. Flowers hermaphro- 
dite, regular or obliquely irregular, solitary and terminal, or in spikes or 
corymbs or panicles, or clustered, enclosed within 2 spathaceous usually 
scarious bracts. Perianth superior, petaloid, marcescent ; segments 6, m 
2 series, imbricate. Stamens 3, epigynous or inserted on the outer perianth- 
seoments ; filaments free or united into a tube; anthers 2-celled, opening 
outwards. Ovary inferior, 3-celled; style filiform, usually 3-fid above ; 
divisions stigmatic at the end, subulate or narrow or broad, sometimes 
petaloid ; ovules numerous, in the inner angle of each cell, anatropous. 
Fruit a coriaceous 3-celled usually trigonous capsule, loculicidally 3-valved. 
Seeds usually numerous, albuminous ; embryo short, cylindric, 
A large family, comprising nearly 60 genera and about 800 species, dispersed over 
the whole world, but most abundant and varied in South Africa, plentiful in south 
Europe, not infrequent in America, comparatively rare in Asia. The family includes 
few useful species. Some are said to be purgative and diuretic, and the dried stigmas 
of the saffron (Crocus sativus) are a well-known dye. Many of the species are cultivated 
in gardens on account of the beauty of their flowers, especially of the genera Iris, Crocus, 
Ixia, and Gladiolus. The single New Zealand genus extends to Australia on the one 
side and South America on the other. 
LIBERTIA Spreng. |G as- Absok. ry ae & 
Trae. € 
Perennial herbs with a short creeping rhizome and long fibrous Toots. 
Leaves numerous, densely crowded at the base of the stem, distichously 
imbricate, equitant, linear or ensiform, flat, ngid. Flowering-stems erect, 
simple or branched; cauline leaves few. Flowers on slender pedicels, 
clustered in the axils of sheathing bracts, forming a corymbose-paniculate or 
subumbellate inflorescence. Perianth regular, tube wanting; segments 6, 
spreading, free to the base, the 3 inner rather longer and _ broader. 
Stamens 3; filaments free or slightly connate at the base; anthers linear- 
sagittate, versatile. Ovary 3-celled ; ovules many im each cell; style short, 
with 3 linear-subulate spreading branches. Capsule broadly oblong or 
obovoid or globose, 3-valved. Seeds angled or compressed, smooth or 
foveolate. 
