MR. C. B. CLARKE ON THE FERNS OF NORTHERN INDIA. 547 
the microscope. The veinlets are not divided where the sorus is placed, but are carried 
beyond its centre of attachment, sometimes a very little way, sometimes distinctly 
beyond the circle of the sorus (see Pl. LX XX. fig. 2). Involuere none that I can find 
in the youngest stage. Beddome’s suggestion (Ferns Brit. Ind. Suppl. p. 21) that the 
genus is Leucostegia will not do at all. 
Subgenus II. Goniopteris. Lowest pair of veinlets (and often some others) uniting 
into a veinlet carried to the sinus, not otherwise branching. Veinlets all carried to 
the margin. Sori all across the veinlets, none terminal. Fronds large, pinnate (in 
the Indian species). 
Nearly all the species of this section are referred by Col. Beddome to Hunephrodium, 
as he finds a very thin involucre present in the earliest stage of fruiting. It is doubtful 
whether some of the species are not mere duplicates of those referred to Hunephrodium. 
12. P. uRopHYLLUM, Wall. Cat. 299. Rhizome shortly creeping; stipes approximate, 
with lanceolate-linear brown scales on their lower half; pinnz narrow-oblong, 
caudate-acuminate, margin crenate or slightly serrate, surface glabrous above, often 
glandulose-punctate beneath, veins and margin nearly always with some minute 
pubescence; young sori orbicular, but distant from the main veinlets, and often 
confluent in age.—Hook. Sp. Fil. v. 9 (excl. syn.); Hk. & Baker, Syn. Fil. 314; 
Benth. Fil. Austr. vii. 765. Goniopteris lineata, Bedd. Ferns Brit. Ind. t.3. Phe- 
gopteris urophylla, Mett. Farngatt. Pheg. & Asp. 26. 
From Gurwhal to Bhotan and Chittagong, alt. 1000-5000 feet; common.—Distrib. 
South India, Ceylon, Malaya, North Australia, Polynesia. 
This fern is said to be difficult to distinguish from N. glandulosum and from Meniscium 
cuspidatum ; but, so far as the North-India material is concerned, there is not much 
difficulty. in Nephrodium glandulosum the involucre is distinct, not at all difficult to find, 
and the upper surface of the frond is strigose. In JMeniscium cuspidatum the young 
sori are linear, and often extend nearly to the midribs (as well as to the junction- 
veinlet); the frond is without pubescence.—The real difficulty is to distinguish 
P. urophyllum from P.multilineatum. Col. Beddome says (Bedd. Ferns Brit. Ind. Suppl. 
p. 18) that his own picture of Nephrodium lineatum is our P. urophyllum ; and I can find 
no difference in the Herbarium bundles, except that P. RER WE is the name given to 
the less deeply serrated specimens: I see no line at all. 
Var. khasiana. Margin of the pinne entire; veins very red ; sori exactly round. 
Khasia and Sikkim.—Marked by Col. Beddome Nephrodium lineatum, Presl; referred 
by Mr. Baker to P. rubrinerve ; but the fact is that this var. khasiana has a more entire 
margin than P. rubrinerve or P. meniscioides, and is perhaps better entitled to be marked 
a species than many species of Goniopteris admitted by Baker. ‘The sori are particularly 
exinvolucrate, though I do not say that there may not be a thin covering in the first 
stage, as Beddome calls it Nephrodium. 
18. P. MULTILINEATUM, Wall; Hook. Sp. Fil. v. 11. Pinne narrow-oblong, caudate- 
