6–8 pairs, gradually diminishing towards the base of the petiole, sharply toothed or incised; cauline leaves or bracts few, deeply incised. Flowering-stems few or several, erect or spreading, strict, terete, clothed with a short fine pubescence intermixed with long silky hairs, branched above, forming a few-flowered cymose panicle. Flowers small, white, ¼–⅓ in. diam.; pedicels elongating in fruit. Calyx-tube turbinate; lobes ovate-deltoid, acute. Petals small, rounded. Fruiting receptacle silky. Achenes numerous, spreading, 1⁄12 in. long, perfectly glabrous, oblong-ovoid, somewhat turgid, narrowed into a short hooked or spirally recurved style.—Kirk, Students' Fl. 130.
South Island: Nelson—Mount Arthur Plateau, T. F. C.; Mount Murchison, W. Townson! Canterbury—Broken River, Enys! Otago—Upper Waipori, Mount Cardrona, Cambrians, Petrie! Ben Lomond, near Queenstown, B. C. Aston! Stewart Island: G. M. Thomson. 1000–4000 ft.
Readily distinguished from all the preceding species by the smooth and glabrous achenes narrowed into a very short recurved style.
6. G. pusillum, Petrie in Trans. N.Z. Inst. xxviii. (1896) 538.—Small, depressed, 1–2 in. high. Leaves few, all radical, rosulate, obovate-spathulate in outline, ¾–l in. long, sparsely covered with rather long strigose hairs, pinnate; terminal leaflet ¼–⅓ in. broad, rounded, crenate-toothed; lateral leaflets 5–8 pairs, gradually diminishing in size, bluntly toothed. Scapes 1–2 in. high, 1-flowered. simple, naked or with 1–3 minute bracts, finely and closely pubescent. Flowers minute, white. Calyx-tube broadly turbinate; lobes ovate-deltoid. Petals 5–6, small, elliptic-oblong. Fruiting receptacle elongated, villous. Achenes very small, perfectly glabrous, obliquely oblong or obovoid; style minute, reduced to a recurved point.—Kirk, Students' Fl. 130.
South Island: Otago—Old Man Range, altitude 5000 ft., Petrie!
Allied to G. leiospermum, but separated by the much reduced size, 1-flowered scapes, smaller flowers, and minute achenes, the style of which is reduced to little more than a hooked point.
3. POTENTILLA, Linn.
Perennial herbs, rarely shrubs. Leaves either pinnate or digitately 3–5-foliolate; stipules adnate to the petiole. Flowers solitary or in corymbose cymes. Calyx persistent, lobes 5 or rarely 4, valvate, alternating with as many bracteoles. Petals 5, rarely 4, usually broad. Stamens numerous. Disc annular or coating the calyx-tube. Carpels many, rarely few, seated on a small dry receptacle; style persistent or deciduous, terminal or lateral; ovule solitary, pendulous. Achenes usually numerous, crowded into a head surrounded by the persistent calyx.
A large genus in the arctic and temperate portions of the Northern Hemisphere, extending into the mountains of the tropics, but extremely rare in the Southern Hemisphere. The New Zealand species is almost cosmopolitan.
