Page:Manual of the New Zealand Flora.djvu/268

228 : Coal Island, Preservation Inlet, Kirk! and adjacent islets, ''Lyall, Petrie! Kirk!'' Var. robusta: The Snares, Kirk! Punui. December–February.

Has precisely the habit of Stilbocarpa polaris, and in a flowerless state may easily be taken for it. The leaves are less fleshy and coriaceous, and want the bristles on the upper surface; the petioles are terete; the flowers reddish, with narrower petals; the ovary 2-celled, crowned with the very evident stylopodia; and the fruit is not hollowed at the apex.

Evergreen trees or shrubs. Leaves simple or more usually digitately or pinnately divided. Flowers polygamous or diœcious, jointed at the top of the pedicels, umbellate; umbels simple or compound, variously arranged. Calyx-limb entire or 5-toothed. Petals 5, valvate. Stamens 5. Ovary 2- or rarely 3–4-celled; styles free or connate at the base, their tips free, usually recurved. Fruit compressed or nearly globose, 2–4-celled, exocarp succulent or coriaceous; seeds 1 in each cell.

1. P. lineare, Hook. f. Fl. Nov. Zel. i. 93.—A small sparingly branched shrub 5–10 ft. high; branches spreading, stout and woody, bearing numerous simple or trifid coriaceous scales mixed with the leaves. Leaves of young trees crowded, ascending, simple, 5–10 in. long, $1⁄5$–$1⁄3$ in. wide, narrow-linear, acute, gradually narrowed into a short stout petiole, remotely and obscurely sinuate-serrate, excessively thick and coriaceous, midrib and margins thickened. Leaves of mature trees 2–4 in. long, ½–¾ in. wide, linear or linear-lanceolate, obtuse or acute, obscurely serrate, very thick and coriaceous, midrib and margins thickened; petiole short, $1⁄8$–$1⁄6$ in. long, jointed on to the branch. Flowers small, diœcious. Umbels usually terminal, but occasionally axillary as well, compound, shorter than the leaves; rays 3–7, bracteolate. Ovary 3–5-celled; styles the same number as