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printed without my correction, consequently the colouring in plate 26 is not quite correct, and plates 18 and 25 are not so good as they should be.
Professor Kirk, Conservator of Forests, &c, and Mr. Cheeseman, Curator of the Auckland Museum, have kindly aided me throughout. My brother, Henry S. McKellar, Secretary and Inspector of Customs, New Zealand, and my brother-in-law, Dr. Hetley, of Norbury Lodge, Upper Norwood, have kindly assisted me greatly. I have also to thank Sir J. Dalton Hooker, Mr. Thistleton Dyer, Director of Kew Gardens, Mr. Morris, Assistant Director, Professor Oliver, and Mr. Baker, under whom I worked at the Herbarium at Kew. Also Mr. Rolfe, who kindly showed me how to make the dissections, found the books I required, and helped me in every way he could.
I enjoyed my stay at Kew writing descriptions, doing dissections, and obtaining information from the numerous books, many of which are not to be obtained elsewhere. I am sorry it is over and that my work is done for the present. I should be glad to continue it. I have many more flowers than I was able to put in these three parts; some lovely and interesting ones I was sorry to leave out, and I could paint many more after my return to New Zealand, and make this work a more complete one, if I received sufficient encouragement to do so.
I was asked to put in dissections of the flowers, and, not having sufficient knowledge myself, I have traced all I could find from different books at Kew, and have named the authority from which I took them.
The others I have tried to do from some dried specimens I had, I am afraid they are of no real value botanically, but they may be of some assistance to amateurs. I trust my kind subscribers will excuse their faults and accept them for what they are worth. I feel how very imperfectly I have represented the flowers, but if I should be able to continue the work, the additional experience and the knowledge I have obtained at Kew, will, I trust, enable me to make my drawings of more botanical value and interest to the friends who have so kindly assisted me in the production of this work.
