62 



Fermentation — Your tobacco would appear to have followed the 

 lines of the American Sumatra leaf in the Washington bulletins 

 which perhaps suits that leaf, but it is quite different to a Deli 

 ferment. 



For instance, you ran it up on first bulking to 125 F. 52 C. I 

 should have turned it at 40 once or twice, and then brought it 

 gradually up to 52" or higher, but of course all depends on how 

 the tobacco looks when turned. 



Too rapid fermentation makes the leaf first tender then weak, 

 and an excessive rise in temperature may burn it altogether. Too 

 slow and you dry it out, so it's like fly fishing, cast too fine or too 

 coarse and you lose your fish. 



It would seem the climate of Jamaica is very suitable for the 

 growth of a nice cigar leaf, and I trust that your experiments will 

 induce growers to take it up. 



Our shade unfortunately was blown right away in a storm, so I 

 have no shade tobacco in Bam. The plants were about 3 feet 

 high, growing fast and gave every promise of being a fine leaf, 

 so I was sorry. 



Perhaps later you would feel inclined to exchange samples of 

 our fermented leaf. I am just beginning fermentation now and 

 will be finished about March. 



I find a good plan is to get a few bundles of Sumatra leaf to 

 keep by one as a standard. 



A NEW NAME FOR A JAMAICAN FERN.* 



By William R. Maxon. 



In the first fascicle of Christensen's Index Filicum (1905), Acros- 

 tichum lomarioides, Jenman, a middle American species, is reduced 

 to A. aureum, L., supposed to be dispersed generally throughout 

 the tropics. In first proposing lomarioides, Jenman suggested that 

 A. aureum might prove an aggregate of several more or less closely 

 related species ; and arguing from analogous cases we judge this 

 to be likely. But at present we are concerned only with lomarioides, 

 described at length by Jenman ; this and aureum he held to be as 

 distinct as " any two closely allied species in any genus." Seve- 

 ral recent writers have not held to this opinion ; but from field 

 observation and the collection of adequate material we are quite 

 convinced that the two are, as Jenman has said, absolutely distinct, 

 and we shall try to prove this conclusively in a later paper. 



Jenman's use of lomarioides for an American plant is, however, 

 invalidated by the earlier application of the same name to an East 

 Indian species, by Bory. In its stead we propose, with the same 

 type: 



Acrostichum excelsum nom. nov. 



Chrysodium lomarioides, Jenman, Timehri 4 : 314. 1885. 



Acrostichum lomarioides, Jenman, Bull. Bot. Dept. Jamaica. 

 II. 5 : 154, 1898. 



Not Bory, Belang. Voy. Bot. 2 : 21. pi. 2. 1833. 



* Pioe. of The Biological Society of Washington. Vol. XVm. Oct. 17. 190 



