MAXON—-STUDIES OF TROPICAL AMERICAN FERNS. 593 
toothed; venation wholly goniophlebioid, a single row of oblique broadly ellipti- 
cal areoles extending nearly to the margin, the few veinlets short and obliquely 
excurrent, free or forming an incomplete minor row of areoles; sori about 10 
pairs, small, inframedial, terminal upon the short simple included veinlet, 
nearly concealed by the scales of the segment. Leaf tissue dull green, rigidly 
coriaceo-herbaceous. 
Type in the U. S. National Herbarium, no. 833131, collected from trees and 
rocks, “ Boqueron del Rio Dagua,” western Cordillera, Province of Cali, Colom- 
bia, altitude 300 to 1,000 meters, by F. C. Lehmann (no. 7666). 
Relafed to P. lepidopteris, under which species it was listed by Hieronymus,’ 
but differing widely not only in the form and cellular structure of its rigid 
(not flaccid) rhizome scales but also in the form and structure of the very 
abundant scales of the under surface of the lamina. The latter are exceedingly 
numerous and so closely placed and rigidly appressed-imbricate that their bases 
are completely obscured, the appearance being that of a very dense silky 
covering. 
A single additional collection of P. bombycinum is in the National Herbarium: 
PanaMA: Vicinity of Cana, Province of Panama, alt. 1,050 meters, June 3, 
1912, Goldman 1915. 
13. Polypodium balaonense Hieron. Bot. Jahrb. Engler 34: 529. 1905. 
TYPE LOCALITY: Near Balao, Ecuador (Eggers 14286). 
DISTRIBUTION : Ecuador. 
This excellent species, which is undoubtedly the one mistakenly described by 
Sodiro? as P. lepidopteris, is briefly but adequately distinguished by Hierony- 
mus. The scales of the rhizome may be further described as follows: 2.5 to 
3.5 mm. long, light castaneous with paler borders, exactly ovate in the lower 
half, thence narrowly linear-attenuate, the borders throughout irregularly den- 
ticulate (closely so in the basal part), the teeth slender, sometimes connivent, 
deeply cleft at their tip, the two divisions often unequal; median cells of the 
basal portion mostly elongate-hexagonal, subopaque (open lumina mostly want- 
ing), the partition walls very strongly sclerotic, with interior, transverse, elon- 
gate, moniliform thickenings. 
The following specimens are in the U. S. National Herbarium: 
Ecuapor: Balao, growing upon forest trees, January, 1892, Eggers 14286 
(the type collection). Near El Recreo, Province of Manabi, Eggers 
14873. 
14. Polypodium pyrrholepis (I*ée) Maxon. 
Goniophlebium pyrrholepis Fée, Mém. Foug. 8: 94. 1857. 
TYPE LOCALITY: Huatusco, Veracruz, Mexico (W. Schaffner 197). 
DISTRIBUTION : Apparently confined to the State of Veracruz, Mexico. 
This species, which was most injudiciously reduced to P. lepidopteris by 
Fournier,’ and is so referred also in Christensen’s Index Filicum, is represented 
in the National Herbarium by an excellent series of specimens, which show it 
to be an ally of P. squamatum rather than of P. lepidopteris. It differs from 
P. lepidopteris in its longer stipes, in its broader, nonattenuate lamin, and in 
the form and structure of its rhizome scales (these divergent, rigidly bristle- 
like in general appearance, 2.5 to 4.5 mm. long, abruptly attenuate-acicular from 
a small roundish or narrowly ovate base and very highly colored, the median 
cells nearly opaque, the strongly sclerotic partition walls apparently somewhat 
* Bot. Jahrb. Engler 34: 529. 1905. 
* Crypt. Vase. Quit. 361. 1893. 
* Mex. Pl. Crypt. 84. 1872. 
