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Manual of the New Zealand Flora.

2. Mimulus, Linn

2. Mimulus, Linn.

Erect or prostrate herbs. Leaves opposite, entire or toothed. Flowers solitary and axillary, or the upper ones sometimes forming a terminal raceme. Calyx tubular or campanulate, 5-angled, 5-toothed. Corolla tubular at the base, 2-lipped above; upper lip erect or spreading, 2-lobed; lower spreading, 3-lobed; throat usually with two protuberances. Stamens 4, didynamous; anthers all perfect, 2-celled; cells divergent, often confluent at the top. Style slender; stigma of 2 flat laminæ. Capsule loculicidally dehiscent, valves usually splitting away from a central column which bears the placentas. Seeds small, numerous.

A genus of about 50 species, most numerous in western America, found more sparingly in eastern and tropical Asia, South Africa, and Australia; not known in Europe in the wild state. The single New Zealand species extends to Australia and Tasmania.

M. repens, R. Br. Prodr. 439.—Perfectly glabrous. Stems stout, succulent, creeping and rooting at the joints; branches prostrate or ascending or erect, 1–5 in. long. Leaves opposite, sessile, often stem-clasping, ⅙–¼ in. long, broadly ovate to oblong, obtuse, quite entire, thick and succulent, pitted when dry. Flowers few, page 485 axillary and solitary; peduncles stout, usually shorter than the leaves. Calyx broadly funnel-shaped or almost obconic, truncate at the mouth, minutely toothed. Corolla variable in size, ¼–½ in. diam., white with a yellow throat; tube dilated upwards, much longer than the calyx; lobes broad, rounded. Capsule broadly oblong, obtuse, enclosed in the calyx, about ¼ in. long.—Hook. f. Fl. Nov. Zel. i. 188; Handb. N.Z. Fl. 202; Bot. Mag. t. 5423; Benth. Fl. Austral. iv. 482. M. Colensoi, Kirk in Trans. N.Z. Inst. iii. (1871) 179.

North and South Islands: Salt marshes from the North Cape to the south of Otago, not common. November–January.

Mr. Kirk's M. Colensoi is a form with erect sparingly divided branches, but it does not otherwise differ from the type. The species is common in many parts of Australia and Tasmania.