FEBNS OF THE MALAY-ASIATIC KBGION. 27 



Ceratopteris thalictroides (L.) Brongn. (Plate XV.) 



.Stipes 5 to 30 em high, fleshy; frond deltoid-ovate; rachises flattened 

 and winged; pinnules few and their segments very few ; sterile segments 

 oblong or lanceolate, usually obtuse, entire, fleshy or membranaceous; 



fertile segments narrowly linear, acute, often deficient in chlorophyll, the 

 margin folded over the sporangia. This fern is common in wet meadows 

 and along ditches. The fronds normally stand above the water, but the 

 sterile are not rarely immersed. 

 Pantropic, and north to Japan. 



9. MATONIACELE. 



Rhizome creeping hairy; fronds dichotomous hut with unequal develop- 

 ment of the hranches; sori dorsal, of few (up to 14) sporangia home on 

 or at the hase of a raised receptacle, which also hears the umbrella-shaped 

 peltate indusium; sporangia opening almost transversely; annulus only 

 oblique enough to he complete. Two genera and only three known 

 species. Perhaps the remnant of a primitive group ancestral to Poly- 

 podiaceae and Cyatheaceae. 



Frond erect, pedate or fan-shaped 1. Matonia 



Frond pendent, sympodial. elongate 2 4 Pkanerosoru* 



I, MATONIA EL Brown. 



Fronds erect stout, rachis forked at the apex, each branch giving off 

 pinnatifid pinnae on the upper (inner) side; veins free except that the 

 sori are home where a number of veinlets converge; indusium curved 

 hack under the sporangia almost to the receptacle. 



Segments oblique, acute 1. I/- peciiimta 



Segments at a right angle, obtuse 2. •/• Fomoorthyi 



1. Matonia pectinata R. Br. 



Stipe rigid, about 2 m high when well developed ; Longer pinnae 20 

 (to 60?) cm long, linear, hard-coriaceous, brownish above, more or less 

 glaucous beneath, glabrous; segments borne at an acute angle, falcate, 

 narrowed from the hase. acute; sori home at the bases of the segments; 

 sporangia about 7. 



Malacca. Mount Ophir; Amboyna? 



•2. Matonia foxworthyi Copel. Philip. Journ. Sci. Bot. 3 | L908) 343. (Plate 

 XVI.) 



Like the preceding species, hut the segments horizontal, straight, oh- 

 tuse, truncate, or refuse, linear, up to 35 mm long, often bearing more 

 than one sorus on a side. 



Borneo, Sarawak. Mount Poe. alt. 1,700 m. 



