Page:Picturesque New Zealand, 1913.djvu/403

Rh palm, it thrives best near the sea, and seldom grows far from water. Bending seaward, the pohutukawa sweeps over until its immense, sprawling top is sometimes almost upside down. In many cases its overhanging branches are sprayed by the surf, and occasionally oysters collect on them. When blossoming, scarlet flowers with numerous slender stamens burst from myriad sheaves. Then for miles on beach and high on cliff, I have seen Maoriland's Christmas tree flaming against landscape and sky.

A hardy plant that is most common on low and swampy ground is the cabbage tree, or palm lily, which bears a white, sweet-scented flower. In New Zealand it has a wide range, and in places forms forests. Some species are from twenty to twenty-five feet high; others are so dwarfed as to be stemless. The limbs are all at the top of the tree, and at the end of each limb and its branches is a bunch of sword-like leaves resembling the spiky head of the pineapple plant. They are from one foot to three feet long, and in their centre grows a large cluster of white berries, which are relished by pigeons. A peculiarity of the leaves is their phosphorescence when decaying. Perhaps no New Zealand plant is harder to kill than the cabbage tree, so named because settlers once ate its soft, immature heads as a substitute for cabbage. So tenacious is the soft wood that even its chips have taken root in damp soil. On it fire makes little impression. Pieces cut from living specimens cause little or no