212 Transactions. — Botamj. 



Art. XXVIII. — On newly -discovered and imperfectly -known Ferns 

 of New Zealand, with Critical Observations. 



By W. Colenso, F.E.S., F.L.S., etc. 

 [Read before the Haioke's Bay Philosophical Institute, llth July, 1887.] 



Class III. CrYPTOGA^A. 



Order I.— FILICES. 

 Genus 1.* Gleichenia, Smith. 



§ EUGLEICHENIA. 



1. G. patens, sp. nov. 



Plant erect, about 3-4 feet high (from specimens received). 

 Rhizome creeping (apparently epigaeous), very long (in speci- 

 mens 2 feet or more), rather slender, li lines diameter and 

 of uniform thickness, pretty straight, rarely branched, light 

 reddish-brown (as also stipe), roughish (sub-muricate) ; scales 

 few, scattered, broadly ovate-cordate, reticulate, coarsely fim- 

 briate; rootlets numerous, wiry, branched, 1-3 inches long, 

 descending from under-surface only at irregular distances, 

 \— 1 inch apart, single and in bunches of 2-3, resembling 

 nodal rootlets. Stipes about 2 feet apart on rhizome, 2-3 

 feet long, dry, slender, uniform, cylindrical, about 1 line dia- 

 meter, hollow with a central pith, straight and sub-fiexuous, 

 smooth, shining, 2-branched at top, these two main branches 

 opposite, squarrose, spreading, with a large bud in their axil 

 (also in the axils of the secondary branches), and 4 pinna? 

 at their bases, 2 up and 2 down. Frond large, spreading, 

 dichotomous, distantly branched at almost right angles ; 

 branches and branchlets very slender, sub-bipinnate, light- 

 red-brown; rhachis and sub-rhachises thickly covered with 

 dark-brown adpressed scales (similar to those on rhizome), 

 their fimbria? or stout hairs patent, rigid, dark, wavy, acute; 

 branchlets sub-linear-ovate or linear-oblong, 5-6 (sometimes 

 8-9) inches long. 2-3 inches wide, ultimate branchlets forked, 

 inrparipinnate. Pinna? petiolulate, free, linear not acuminate, 

 1-1 \ inches long, 1-2 lines wide, bright green above, a little 

 paler below, glabrous, patent and sub-falcate, symmetrical, 

 very distant, 2-3 lines apart and alternate on rhachis, 3-5 

 lines apart opposite and sub-opposite on secondary branches, 

 sometimes, though rarely, 2 together, and sometimes forked; 

 midrib truncate, or with a smaller oblique lobe at apex ; 

 lobes distinct, cut to rhachis, alternate, close at bases but 



* The numbers attached to the orders and genera in this paper are 

 those of them in the "Handbook, Flora of New Zealand." 



