Ser. Melanosperme^. Fam. Sporochnoidece. 



Plate XCII. 



SPOROCHNUS APODUS, Harv. 



Gen. Char. Frond filiform, solid, pinnately decompound. Receptacles pod- 

 shaped, pedicellate (rarely sessile), crowned with a tuft of soft hairs, 

 and densely covered with whorled, branching, sporiferous filaments. 

 Spores oblong, attached to the filaments. — Sporochnus [Ag.], from 

 (TTTopo^, a seed, and ')(yoo<i, wool; because tufts of soft hairs crown 

 the fructification. 



'Frons filiformis, solida, pinnatim ramosa. Receptacula siliquceformia, scepis- 

 sivie pedicellata, apice comosa, paranematibus ramosis horizontalibus verticil- 

 latis densissime vestita. Sporce ohovoidecs, ad paranemata laterales. 



Sporochnus apodus ; frond setaceous ; the branches very long, subsimple ; 

 receptacles sessile, linear-oblong, subacute, horizontally patent, densely 

 set. 



S. apodus ; fronde setacea, ramis longissimis simpliciuscidis ; receptaculk sessili- 

 bus lineari-oblo7i(/is subacutis horizontaliter patentibiis numerosissimis crebris- 

 que. 



Sporochnus apodus, Harv. m Hook. Fl. Tasm. v. 2. p. 287. 



Hab. At Georgetown, Tasmania ; very rare, W. H. H. 



Geogr. Distr. Tasmania. 



Descr. Root and base of the frond unknown. Stem as thick as hog's-bristle, 

 of unknown length, set at intervals of \-\ inch with alternate branches. 

 Branches very long, 1-li feet in length, tlu'ead-like, attenuated to the ex- 

 tremity, either quite simple or emitting a few slender, irregular, and more or 

 less barren branchlets, 1-3 inches in length. The branches are tipped with 

 a rather small brush-like tuft of filaments, and throughout their whole 

 length densely set with horizontally patent spine-like receptacles. These 

 receptacles are 1-2 fines long, quite sessile, broadest at base, subcylindrical, 

 but shghtly taperiog upwards, and ending in a narrow, gland-tipped point, 

 from which springs a tuft of soft, articulated, deciduous, byssoid fibres. 

 The receptacles are of the ordinary structure, consisting of irregularly branched 

 filaments, bearing spores, and whorled round a cylindrical axis. The colour 

 is dark-olive when dry, paler and more tawny when fresh. The substance 

 is soft ; and the plant adheres to paper in drying. 



I am not partial to proposing new species on the faith of 

 solitary specimens, yet there are some cases in which it is un- 



