2. R. Buchanani, Hook. f. Handb. N.Z. Fl. 5.—Stout, erect, more or less covered with long silky hairs, rarely almost glabrous. Rootstock thick, with numerous long fleshy rootlets. Radical leaves on long petioles 2–6 in. long, with short and broad sheathing bases; blade reniform in outline, 2–6 in. diam., ternatisect, main divisions stalked, more or less deeply divided into linear or cuneate lobes, which are usually again 3–5-fid or -toothed, rarely entire. Cauline leaves similar, but usually more finely cut, sessile or nearly so. Flowers solitary or 2–3, large, white, 1½–2½ in. diam. Sepals 5, oblong, villous. Petals very numerous, linear-oblong, rounded at the apex, narrowed to the base; gland solitary, basilar. Achenes turgid, pilose, forming a globose head ½ in. diam.—Kirk, Students' Fl. 8.
South Island: Otago—Lake district, Buchanan! Mounts Bonpland, Tyndall, and Aspiring, Petrie! Bald Peak, B. C. Aston! Mount Earnslaw, H. J. Matthews! Altitudinal range 4000–6000 ft. December–January.
A singular and beautiful plant, quite unlike any other, confined, so far as is known, to the high mountains to the west of the Otago lake district. The leaves are said to be sometimes nearly entire, and the flowers yellow, but I have not seen specimens showing these peculiarities.
3. R. insignis, Hook. f. Fl. Nov. Zel. i. 8, t. 2.—A stout, erect, paniculately branched plant 1–3 ft. in height, usually villous in all its parts, brownish or rufous when dry. Radical leaves numerous, large, on stout petioles with broad sheathing bases, thick and coriaceous, rounded-cordate or reniform, crenate and often shortly lobed, 4–9 in. diam.; cauline smaller, upper ones cut and lobed. Peduncles often very numerous, stout; bracts linear-oblong. Flowers golden-yellow, 1–2 in. diam. Sepals 5, woolly at the back. Petals 5–6, rarely more, obcordate, with 1 or 2 glands at the base. Stamens many, short. Receptacle oblong, pubescent. Achenes forming a rounded head ½ in. diam., tumid, villous; style long, slender.—Handb. N.Z. Fl. 4; Kirk, Students' Fl. 7. R. ruahinicus, Col. in Trans. N.Z. Inst. xviii. (1886) 256. R. sychnopetala. Col. l.c. xxv. (1893) 324, and xxvi. (1894) 313 (a monstrous state with very numerous narrow petals). R. rufus. Col. l.c. xxviii. (1896) 591.