Scene in a New Zealand forest near Porirua, Plate 6. From the book: The New Zealanders

PLATE VI.

SCENE IN A NEW ZEALAND FOREST.

THERE is no country in the world so rich in ferns as New Zealand--the variety and elegance of their forms from the most minute species, to the giant tribe, is astonishing-- some attain a height of forty feet, whilst others of exquisite beauty are extremely small.

Two examples of the tree-ferns are figured in the accompanying scene--the Cyathea medullaris, and the Cyathea dealbata; the pulp of the former, at certain seasons of the year, is used as food by the natives, and when boiled, resembles apple sauce.

During night, the forests frequently present a most beautiful appearance--the decaying and fallen trees, and the whole surface of the ground, covered with decomposed vegetable matter, sparkles with phosphorescence in every direction.

So exuberant is vegetable life in these damp and gloomy forests, that it is difficult to find a single space, even on the trunks of the largest trees, not covered with plants; the warm and silent dells, eternally shaded from the sunbeams, by their lofty canopy of foliage, and fed with the ceaseless moisture that drops from every spray, are filled with palms, ferns, and countless parasites--all luxuriant to excess; and amid the gloom of these Antipodeal forests, there reigns a solemn and almost unbroken stillness. A vast portion of New Zealand, is covered with forest-clad mountains, yielding some of the finest timber, and the most ornamental and elegant woods in the world.

Text for plate 6: The New Zealanders illustrated / by George French Angas. -- London: Thomas M'Lean, 1847 (RB001054)