1. Agathis, Salisb.

Evergreen monoecious or diœcious trees, often of great size. Leaves subopposite or alternate, broad, flat, coriaceous; nerves parallel. Male flowers solitary, axillary, peduncled; peduncle furnished with imbricate scales at the top. Anthers densely spirally arranged on a cylindrical column; cells 5–15, pendulous from the top of a rigid stipes. Female cones terminating short branchlets, broadly ovoid or globose; scales densely spirally arranged, tips broad. Ovules solitary or rarely 2 at the base of each scale and adnate to it, reversed. Mature cone globose or nearly so; scales closely imbricating and appressed, broad, flattened, hard bu, scarcely woody. Seeds 1 to each scale, very rarely 2, reversedt compressed, ovate or oblong; testa thin, produced into a membranous wing; albumen fleshy; cotyledons 2.

A genus of 6 or 7 species of timber-trees, ranging through the Malay Archipelago, north-east Australia, the Pacific islands, and New Zealand. The New Zealand species is endemic, although stated by Parlatore (D.C. Prodr. xvi. 2, 376) and Eichler (Naturlichen Pflanzenfamilien ii. 1, 67) to occur in Australia.

• 1. A. australis, Salisb. in Trans. Linn. Soc. viii. (1807) 312.— A lofty forest-tree, with a straight columnar trunk and rounded somewhat bushy head, highly resiniferous in all its parts, usually ranging from 80 to 100 ft. high, with a trunk 4–10 ft. diam., but attaining an extreme height of 150 ft., with a trunk 15–22 ft. diam.; bark glaucous-grey, deciduous, falling off in large flat flakes. Leaves subopposite or alternate, sessile, very thick and coriaceous; of young trees lanceolate, 2–4 in. long, ¼–½ in. broad, gradually passing into those of mature trees, which are ¾–1½in. long, linear-oblong or narrow obovate-oblong, obtuse. Flowers monoecious; males ¾–1½ in. long, cylindrical. Female cones obovoid in the flowering stage, becoming almost spherical when ripe, erect, 2–3 in. diam.; scales broad, flat, rather thin, falling away from the axis at maturity. Seeds 1 to each scale, ovate, compressed, winged.— Kirk, Forest Fl. tt. 79 to 81. Dammara australis, Lamb. Pin. ed. i. 2, 14; A. Cunu. Precur. n. 325; Raoul, Choix, 41; Rook. f. Fl. Nov. Zel. i. 231; Handb. N.Z. Fl. 256. Podocarpus zamise-folius, A. Rich. Fl. Nouv. Zel. 360.

  North Island: Abundant in forests from the North Cape to Tauranga and Kawhia. Sea-level to 2000 ft. Kauri, of the resin kapia.

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  The kauri-pine, too well known to require any detailed account. Timber not excelled by any other for the variety of uses for which it is adapted, and remarkable for its strength, durability, and the ease with which it is worked. The resin, or "kauri-gum," so important for varnish-making, is still dug in large quantities on the sites of previous forests, or obtained from those still living.