Page:Manual of the New Zealand Flora.djvu/28

The foremost place among resident botanists and explorers must be granted to the Rev. W. Colenso, both on account of the number and variety of his discoveries, and the ardour with which, for a period of no less than sixty-five years, he continued to observe and to collect facts and specimens in almost all branches of natural science, always giving the leading place to botany. Arriving in New Zealand in 1834, he was induced, first by the visit of the illustrious Darwin in the "Beagle" in 1835, and later by Allan Cunningham in 1838, to take up the study of the botany of his adopted country, forwarding his specimens from time to time to Sir W. J. Hooker at Kew. At first his collections were confined to the district between Whangarei and the North Cape, but he soon enlarged his field of operations. Space will not permit of a full account of his many journeys, which practically covered the whole length of the North Island, but the following were the most important. In 1841–42 he travelled on foot from Hicks Bay to Poverty Bay, and from thence inland through the rugged and almost inaccessible Urewera Country to Lake Waikaremoana, which he was the first European traveller to reach. He then crossed the Te Whaiti Mountains to Ruatahuna, from whence he proceeded to Rotorua and Tauranga. Striking inland again, he followed the upper Thames Valley to its head, and, crossing to the Waikato River, canoed a hundred miles down the river to its mouth. From thence he followed the west coast to the Kaipara Harbour, then again made for the east coast at Mangawai, finally reaching the Bay of Islands by way of Whangarei and Whangaruru. In 1843 he journeyed from Hicks Bay to Poverty Bay, and thence by sea to Castle Point. From that locality he proceeded to Ahuriri (Hawke's Bay) and the Wairoa River, which he ascended to Waikaremoana, returning by way of Rotorua and Tauranga. In 1844 he transferred his residence from the Bay of Islands to Hawke's Bay, and in the following year made his first expedition to the summit of the Ruahine Range, finding there a harvest of previously unknown alpine and subalpine plants. In 1847 he travelled by way of Titiokura and the Mohaka River to Taupo and Inland Patea, passing along the flanks of Tongariro and Ruapehu, and returning to Hawke's Bay over the Ruahine Range, which he was the first European to cross. These journeys and many others, all made on foot, with a few Native companions only, and often under circumstances of great privation and no little danger, are evidence of the ardour and enthusiasm with which Mr. Colenso carried on his botanical explorations in the early days of the colony. Nor did his zeal diminish with age, for the Transactions of the New Zealand Institute contain papers written by him describing plants collected during a journey made to the flanks of the Ruahine Range in his eighty-fifth year. In addition to numerous writings on the Maori race, on which he was for many years the chief authority, Mr. Colenso contributed no less than fifty-nine papers on botanical subjects to the Transactions