216 Transactions. — Botany. 



margins, 5-6 on a large pinna (sometimes, but rarely, 8-9 

 on the lowest), extending quite round the apex to its lowest 

 corner, 2-3 on the smaller pinnae ; the sinus at first narrow- 

 linear, then circular, in the centre of involucre. Stipes generally 

 longer than frond, 3-5 inches, very slender, almost capillary, 

 wiry, sub-angular, dry, brittle, glossy, dark-purple (as also 

 rhachis and petioles), with a few short linear obtuse brown 

 scales near base. 



Sometimes a frond is met with bearing a small pinnate 

 branchlet at its base, having 2-5 pairs of pinnae, same as those 

 on main rhachis but much smaller ; and occasionally a frond is 

 found with two such divergent branchlets, but smaller still at 

 its base. I have also a specimen with two long forked branch- 

 lets forming a fork at tip of rhachis, as well as two others at 

 base of the frond, and thus having four branchlets besides its 

 ordinary main rhachis. Sometimes the lowest pair of pinnae are 

 large and irregular in shape, sub 3-lobed, and sometimes largely 

 reniform. 



Hab. On the ground at a steep declivity, forming a small 

 bed or patch, and very closely growing together, in a thick wood 

 south of Danneverke, County of Waipawa ; May, 1887 : W.C. 

 (Not noticed anywhere else.) 



Obs. I. It is difficult to fix the near affinities of this interest- 

 ing little species among our known New Zealand AdianUc ; it has 

 certainly a family resemblance, but that is common to the whole 

 of them. Its nearest ally is A. diaphanum, Bl., a Java and 

 Manilla fern (judging from description and drawing of that fern 

 as given by Sir W. J. Hooker, " Sp. Filicum, - ' vol. ii., p. 10, 

 tab. 80), but that species differs from this one in several par- 

 ticulars ; that one being of larger size, with differently shaped, 

 hairy, darker colour, and obscure pinnae, small crowded invo- 

 lucres, etc. Sir "W. J. Hooker has also stated (I.e.) that the 

 specimen he had there figured is an authentic type specimen of 

 that species given to him by Dr. Blume, its discoverer. 



That fern (A. diaphanum) is also said by Bentharn* to be 

 found in Queensland, New South Wales, and New Zealand ; but 

 I have never met with it growing, though lately I received some 

 specimens of the plant from the interior, which agree well with 

 Sir W. J. Hooker's description and figure. Bentham's descrip- 

 tion of it, however, differs widely from Hooker's description and 

 figures. And I also notice, that Bentham there includes one of 

 our well-known and common New Zealand Adian ta — A. affine, 

 Hook., not "Willd.f — with Blume's A. diaphanum, as being iden- 

 tical with it! Baker, also,} says the same — viz., that the New 



* " Flora. Austral.," vol. vii.. p. 725. 

 t "Sp. Fil.," vol. ii., p. 32. 

 I " Syn. Fil., p. 117. 



