Page:Manual of the New Zealand Flora.djvu/563

Veronica.]

38. V. anomala, Armstr. in Trans. N.Z. Inst. iv. (1872) 291.—An erect perfectly glabrous much-branched shrub 3–5 ft. high; branches long, slender, fastigiate, leafy, purplish towards the tips. Leaves spreading, sessile or nearly so, ⅓–¾ in. long, ⅛–⅙ in. broad, linear-oblong or elliptic-lanceolate, subacute, keeled, coriaceous, dark-green and shining above, paler beneath, midrib obscure. Spikes crowded together at the tips of the branches, 5–10-flowered, forming a short terminal panicle; rhachis puberulous; bracts ovate, acute, coriaceous, as long as the calyx. Flowers sessile, white or pale-pink, ¼–⅓ in. diam. Calyx 3-partite with one of the segments broader and emarginate or 2-lobed, more rarely 4-partite; segments linear-oblong, obtuse. Corolla-tube slender, tubular, about twice as long as the calyx; limb either 3-lobed with the anticous lobe entirely suppressed, or 4-lobed with the anticous lobe small and narrow-linear; the dorsal and lateral lobes oblong, obtuse. Capsule ovate-oblong, obtuse, glabrous, half as long again as the calyx.—Trans. N.Z. Inst. xiii. (1881) 355; ''Hook. f. Bot. Mag.'' t. 7360.

39. V. decumbens, Armstr. in Trans. N.Z. Inst. xiii. (1881) 352.—A small decumbent much-branched shrub 1–3 ft. high; branches spreading, purplish-black, bifariously pubescent. Leaves