110 58 



Type from Ecuador, Chiinborazo, Spruce sine num. (Kew!). 



Stipe 35 cm long, ';_• cm thick, trisulcate above, throughout (at base densely) 

 fibrinöse by narrow, lanceolate, hair-pointed, toothed, brown, glossy scales. Lamina 

 bipinnatifid or subbipinnate, 60—70 cm long, grass-green, firmly herbaceous, finely 

 pellucido-punctate; racliis fibrillose like the stipe and densely brown-tonientose 

 above by short, articulated hairs. Pinnæ 12 — 15 cm long, 3'/-' — 4 cm broad, short- 

 stalked, the lower ones not reduced ; upper surface glabrous, the costæ and basal 

 part of the costulæ excepted, which are densely setose by antrorse, subulate, arti- 

 culated hairs; costæ and costulæ beneath rather densely pubescent by patent, short 

 subulate hairs, which are unicellular or consisting of two or rarely three cells, 

 lower part of costæ fibrillose by narrow, brown, hair-like scales, leaf-tissue minutely 

 pubescent by very small hairs. Pinnæ incised nearly or the lower ones quite to 

 the rachis into close, patent, obtuse, entire or shallowly crenated segments, 6 mm 

 broad; basal segments reduced. Veins distant, i-ather indistinct, 7— 8-jugate, most 

 of them forked with the branches not reaching the margin but terminating in a 

 hydathod which is seen on the upperside within the edge as an oblong, pale- 

 brown dot. Sori small, on the middle of the anterior branch of the forked vein, 

 exindusiate, Hooker says (1. c. 107): "involucre minute but apparently persistent 

 rcniformi-rotundate"; in the original specimen the sori are young and only a few 

 of the sporangia developed; the receptacle bears rather many short, reddish, arti- 

 culate hairs, which in the dried plant may be mistaken for a small indusium. 



A very distinct species of uncertain relationship. It differs from the following 

 species by its colour and especially by its upper pinnæ, which are not broadly 

 adnate to rachis with the lower basal segments decurrent. 



51. Dryopteris platyloba (Bak.) C. Chr. Index 285. 1905. — Fig. lie. 



Syn. Pohjpodium rolundatum Hk. spec. 4: 238. 1862 (non Willd.). 



Polijpodiiun platylobiim Bak. Syn. 307. 1867. 



Pohjpodium bisericüe Bak. Syn. 309. 1867, pro parte. 



Polypodiiim tarapotensis Bak. Syn. 505. 1874. 



Dryopteris tarapotensis C. Chr. Ind. 297. 1905. 

 Type from Peru, Tarapoto, Mt. Guayrapurima, Spruce nr. 4656 (Kew!, 

 also RB). 



In Syn. Fil. Baker cited Spruce nr. 4656 as type-number for his three species 

 quoted above. I have the original-specimens of all three species for examination 

 from Kew Herbarium, and I come here upon an instance of species-making, which 

 fortunately is rather uncommon. Certainly the three specimens are not quite 

 identical, that of P. platylobum being bipinnatifid with entire segments while the 

 two others are bipinnate below with lobed segments, but the former specimen is 

 only a smaller leaf of the same species of which the Other two are a more deve- 

 loped state; there is not the slightest diiTerence to find between the specimens as 



