322 Journal of Travel and Natural History 



why even those specimens which have been brought home appear 

 to have arrived in a fragmentary state, two of the new species being 

 described from specimens without fruit, and more of them from 

 fragments of fronds without root, stem, or apex. 



The species (twelve in number) which Dr Kuhn records from 

 Kihmandjaro are : — 



Acrostichum Deckenii, Kuhn, nov. sp. ; Pteris arguta, Ait. ; P. 

 aquihna, Linn., var. lanuginosa, Bory. ; Asplenium anisophyllum, 

 Kze ; A. Sandersoni, Hook. ; A. protensum, Schrad. ; A. con- 

 tiguum, Klf. ; A. Linckii, Kuhn, nov. sp. ; Aspidium Kilmanense, 

 Kuhn, nov. sp. ; A. squamisetum. Hook. ; A. unitum, Mett. ; 

 Polypodium lanceolatum, Linn., var. latifolia, Schldl. Of these, ex- 

 cluding the three supposed novelties, one species, Pteris aquilina, 

 is one of the most widely diffused of plants or animals. The plant 

 which Dr Kuhn regards as Pteris arguta is the P. flabellata of 

 Thunberg, which inhabits Cape Colony, Bourbon, Ascension 

 Island, and West Tropical Africa, and is considered as distinct 

 from the south-west European and Canarian Parguta by some 

 authors. Polypodium lanceolatum belts the world in the tropics, 

 and passes a little beyond them in a southern direction in both 

 hemispheres. Aspidium unitum is like the last, but reaches into 

 temperate regions both north and south of the tropics. Asplenium 

 contiguum was before known only in temperate Asia, and the 

 others, except A. anisophyllum, which is known also in America, 

 are exclusively African ; Aspidium squamisetum being the only 

 one that is exclusively tropical, the others being common to the 

 tropics and the Cape. 



For this instalment of the Flora of Kilimandjaro, small though 

 it be, the scientific world will be grateful, knowing the toils, pri- 

 vations, and difficulties under which they have been collected ; 

 risks which have been too palpably brought home to us in the 

 present instance, by the loss of the life of the deeply lamented 

 Van Der Deck en. 



