132 CHARACTERS OF TRIBES AND GENERA. 



segments more or less contracted ; venules evident, con- 

 tiguous, forming a concrete amorphous receptacle, some- 

 times forming moniliform spikes. 



Type. Acrostichum appendiculatum, Willd. 



Illust. Schott. Gen. Fil., t. 35 ; J. Sm. Ferns, Brit, and 

 For., fig. 35 ; Hook. Syn. Fil., t. 7, fig. 60, h., i., j. 



OBS. The species forming this genus are natives of the 

 Eastern hemisphere, and were originally included by most- 

 authors under Polybotrya ; but as they do not well asso- 

 ciate in habit with the original species of that genus, I 

 therefore adopt Schott's genus Egenolfia. At least eight 

 species have been described as belonging to this group, but 

 after comparing specimens representing the different 

 species, the greater number of them seem to me to be only 

 different forms of one or two, or at most three, species. 

 The chief difference is in the pinnae, which are entire or 

 more or less laciniated, and the whole seem to run into 

 one another. 



Sp. E. asplenifolia (Bory) ; E. appendiculata (Willd.) 

 (v v.) ; E. bipinnatifida, /. Sm. (A. appendiculata var., 

 costulata, Hook. sp. Fil.). 



OBS.' The regular bipinnatifid character of the fronds 

 and their great length seems to mark the last as a 

 distinct species. 



48. POLYBOTRYA, H. B. K. (1810). 



Acrostichum, Hook. Sp. Fil. 



Vernation uniserial, sarmentum thick, elongating, scan- 

 dent, epiphytal, squamose. Fronds pinnate or bi-tripinnate, 

 2 to 4 feet long, glabrous, rarely villose. Veins pinnate, 

 venules free. Fertile segments pinnatifid or spicaeform, 

 convolute, wholly sporangiferous. 



