1902] Davenport, — Notes on New England Ferns, — V 161 



he ought to have done. Here for the first time we have the intro- 

 duction of two species, A r . u/iitum, R. Br., and N. molle, R. Br., with 

 the lower series of veins in the lobes connivent, but otherwise cer- 

 tainly congeneric with Richard's original species. Brown, however, 

 paid no attention to the venation, and as his treatise was devoted to 

 the consideration of New Holland ferns only his list comprises a dif- 

 ferent set of species from Richard's. 



The genus continued to expand through the addition of other 

 species with connivent veins until 1824, when Bory attempted to 

 separate it into two divisions, retaining the connivent-veined species 

 under Nephradium, and proposing a new genus, Lastrata, for the 

 species with free veins, thus exactly reversing what would have been 

 the proper treatment, as Richard's original species were free-veined. 



Bory's proposed genus does not appear to have been well received, 

 but his most unwarrantable division of Nephrodium was carried still 

 further in 1832 by Schott, who, in his Genera Filicum, figured N. 

 molle, R. Br., for the type of Nephrodium, an error which was 

 repeated in 1836 by Presl in his Tentamen Pteridographiae, where, 

 for the first time, the ferns were comprehensively treated on the basis 

 of the character of the venation in conjunction with that of the fructi- 

 fication. 



In that work Presl cited Schott as authority for Nephrodium, 

 although the latter clearly had no intention of appropriating the name 

 to himself as he cited Richard for it. Presl also cited Schott as 

 authority for N molle, notwithstanding the fact that Robert Brown 

 (1. c.) had published the combination in 181 o. 



Not, however, until this work of Presl, had any attention been 

 paid to the character of the venation, which did not therefore enter 

 into previous considerations as a factor in the determination of gen- 

 era. Therefore it was not surprising that Richard's genus should 

 have become so much enlarged by the addition of connivent and 

 netted-veined species as to make some kind of division, if only sec- 

 tional, desirable. The really surprising thing about it is that when 

 such division was deemed necessary, the free-veined species, which 

 were characteristic of the original types should have been set aside 

 and under another name assigned to an author who had nothing to do 

 with the original genus. 



Presl resuscitated Bory's Laslraea, changing the orthography to 

 Lastrea, and assigning to it all of the free-veined species, which, as 



