762 BORAGINACEAE. | Myosotidium. 
tube short; limb spreading, lobes rounded. Fruit 3—-{1n. diam.—Hook. 
jf. Handb. N.Z. Fl. (1864) 196; F. Muell. Veg. Chath. Is. (1864) 32; 
Buch. in Trans. N.Z. Inst. vii (1875) t. 12. Cheesem. Man. NZ. Fl, 
(1906) 472; JU. N.Z. Fl. ii (1914) t. 146. Cynoglossum nobile Hook. 
f. m Gard. Chron. (1858) 240. 
CHATHAM IsLanps: Sandy soi! near the sea, H. H. Travers! J. D. Enys! 
Chatham Islands Lily. 
A noble plant, once very abundant on the coast-line of the Chatham Islands, but 
now fast becoming rare in a wild state. 
’ 
TeETRACHOD RACEARE Shitha: 
3. TETRACHONDRA Petrie. 
Small, creeping, densely matted perennial herb, glabrous or nearly 
so. Leaves small, all opposite, elliptic-oblong, obtuse, quite entire ; 
petioles broad, connate at the base. Flowers terminating short 
axillary branchlets, minute, solitary, tetramerous. Calyx persistent, 
deeply 4-fid; segments ovate, obtuse. Corolla slightly longer than the 
calyx, subrotate; tube very short, naked; limb with 4 ovate lobes 
imbricate in the bud. Stamens 4, inserted at the base of the sinus 
‘between the corolla-lobes; filaments as long or rather longer than the 
anthers; anthers 2-celled, small, rounded, dorsifixed. Ovary 4-partite 
to the base; style erect from between the lobes, twice as long as the 
ovary; stigma small. Nutlets 4, attached by a small base, rounded 
at the back and top, setulose, longer than the persistent calyx and 
style. Seed erect, albuminous; ‘embryo cylindrical, almost as long as 
the albumen; cotyledons equalling the radicle. 
_ A genus of two species, one found in New Zealand, the other (7. patagonica 
Bkotisherg) found in alpine Patagonia. 
‘ Nt aw ® 
Baer on on, sSttew) 
THK: 
I. T. Hamiltoni Petrie ex Oliver in Hook. Ic. Pl. (1892) t. 2250.— 
Forming densely matted patches several inches in diameter. Leaves 
3-75 In. long, rather fleshy, obscurely dotted. Flowers minute, 7 in. 
diam.—T rans. N.Z. Inst. xxv (1893) 269; Cheesem. Man. N.Z. Fl. (1906) 
472. Tillaea Hamiltoni T. Kirk ex W. S. Hamilton in Trans. NZ. 
Inst. xvii (1885) 292. 
Jan Fearn. M§. Hooke. 23 ti (® Se 1892. 
SoutH Istanp: Lowlands in the south and east. Between the Lee Stream and 
Taieri; Hindon; Waipahi; Invercargill, Petrie/ Makarewa River, W. S. Hamilton ! 
Sea-level to 1800 ft. 
A remarkable little plant, the systematic position of which is very doubtful. It 
was originally placed in Tillaea by Kirk, and no doubt there is considerable outward 
similarity “with that genus, although it differs fundamentally in the gamopetalous 
corolla, the 4-lobed ovary, and the simple imbedded style. Prof. Oliver, no doubt 
influenced by the 4-lobed ovary, transferred it to the Boraginaceae, although he points 
out (* Icones Plantarum,” t. 2250) that it departs from the characters of the family 
in the opposite leaves connate at the base, and in the albuminous seeds. Dr, Hans 
Hallier, in an interesting paper printed in the ‘‘ Berichten der Deutschen Botanischen 
Gesellschaft ’’ for 1902, suggests that it should be considered an anomalous member 
of the Scrophularineae, and that its nearest ally is the section Pygmea of Veronica. 
A further important contribution to the literature of the subject is given by Skottsberg 
im a memoir entitled ‘The Systematic Position of Tetrachondra ” (Engl. Bot. Jahrb. 
xlviti (1912) Beib. 17). He altogether repudiates Hallier’s views, and after reviewing 
the whole of the evidence comes to the conclusion that Tetrachondra must find a place 
in the vicmity of the Labiatae, quite possibly as an independent family. Later on 
(* Plant World,” May, 1915 )he founds the family T'etrachondraceae for its reception. 
