North Island: Mountains near the head of the Tairua River, J. Adams! Mount Hikurangi, S. Dodgshun, Adams and Petrie! Tongariro and Ruapehu, Colenso, Captain G. Mair! H. Hill! Rev. F. H. Spencer! Ruahine Mountains, Colenso, Petrie! A. Hamilton! H. Hill! Kaweka Mountain, Colenso! 1500–4500 ft. December–March.
Very close to P. Gnidia, but easily distinguished by the branches being hirsute with coarse hairs. Hooker mentions the "evident lateral nerves" of the leaves as a good character, but I find that the leaves frequently have the veins very obscure.
5. P. virgata, Vahl. Enum. i. 306.—A slender erect much-branched shrub 1–4 ft. high; branches long, slender, virgate, slightly ringed with the scars of the fallen leaves, younger ones more or less clothed with appressed silky hairs. Leaves spreading, close together or remote, not imbricate, almost sessile, ½–1 in. long, linear-lanceolate, acute or acuminate, not coriaceous, flat, nerveless, usually glabrous above, pilose with appressed silky hairs beneath; floral leaves similar or occasionally larger and ovate-lanceolate. Flowers in compact 6–12-flowered heads at the tips of the branches, sometimes becoming axillary by the rapid growth of leafy shoots springing from beneath the heads. Perianth ¼–⅓ in. long,, densely silky-villous; tube swollen at the base; lobes ovate, obtuse. Fruit usually baccate, white, ovoid-oblong, ⅙–¼ in. long, often hairy at the tip.—A. Rich. Fl. Nouv. Zel. 173; A. Cunn. Precur. n. 345; Raoul, Choix, 42; Hook. f. Fl. Nov. Zel. i. 220; Handb. N.Z. Fl. 243. P. pilosa, Willd. Sp. Plant. i. 50. P. dichotoma, Col. in Trans. N.Z. Inst. xxii. (1890) 485. Passerina pilosa, Linn. f. StippL 226; Forst. Prodr. n. 171.
North and South Islands: From the Three Kings Islands and the North Cape to Nelson and Marlborough. Sea-level to 2000 ft. September–December.
A common plant in the northern portion of the colony, well marked by the slender habit and rather lax lanceolate spreading leaves.
6. P. Haastii, T. Kirk in Trans. N.Z. Inst. xii. (1880) 396.—"A strict low-growing shrub 6–10 in. high; branches few (?), very slender, white with silky hairs. Leaves in distant pairs, petioled, ascending, narrow-lanceolate, ¾–1¼ in. long, acute, hairy below or nearly glabrous, margins recurved; floral leaves similar. Flowers 5–8 in a head, very small; perianth swollen below, silky; lobes narrow, spreading. Filaments short. Style equalling the perianthtube. Fruit not seen."
South Island: Alps of Canterbury, Haast, Armstrong!
Of this species I have only seen a single very fragmentary specimen in Mr. Kirk's herbarium, and have consequently quoted the original description. It appears to differ little from P. virgata, except in the more slender habit and distant rather longer and broader leaves.
