76 A CONTRIBUTION TO, ETC. 



B-ockhampton. Sir W. Hooker, in his remarks on this fern, says, 

 " It would be idle to speak of the great acquirements and the un- 

 bounded liberality of the prince of Australian botanists, Dr. 

 Mueller, P.R.S., of London, and G-overnment botanist of Mel- 

 bourne, who must ever rank with the noble-hearted Dr. Wallich 

 amongst botanists. To Dr. Mueller I owe the only specimens 

 of this very remarkable fern that have yet been detected." Cf. 

 Muelleri does not exceed six or eight inches in length, and has 

 pinnae alternate and rather distant, of an inch long and somewhat 

 ovate in shape, clothed on the upper side with dense white scales, 

 and on the lower with rusty ones. There is an excellent figure 

 of this fern in the Species Filicum, and! if it be compared with that 

 of Ceterach, which has sometimes been referred to Gymnogramme, 

 but latterly to Asplenium, many points of resemblance may be 

 traced between the two ferns, especially in the thick fleshy fronds, 

 the dense scales, and immersed forked veins. G. Muelleri has no 

 indusium, unless the membranous ridge which exists on the re- 

 ceptacles just behind the sori be regarded as one. GeteracTi is also 

 destitute of that organ ; but Sir W. Hooker, reasoning from ana- 

 logy, contends that the latter fern is allied to Asplenium alternans, 

 and therefore cannot be placed in the genus Gymnogramme. 

 It was not known to the illustrious author that any species of 

 Meniscium was indigenous in Australia, as it is not long since 

 that at Buckingham Bay, a new species of it was discovered, a 

 description of which may be seen in the 4th vol. of Dr. Mueller's 

 Fragmenta, p. 165. This fern is named M. Kennedyi, in honour 

 of Mr. Kennedy, and it is reported to be a superb plant, allied to 

 M. proliferum, which is now referred to a section of Polypodium. 

 To the genus Meniscium belong several species remarkable for 

 their cresent-shaped sori, which are somewhat parallel and 

 placed across the spaces between the veins of the frond. Some 

 of these ferns approach so near to Hooker's section Goniopferis, 

 that it is not easy to distinguish between them, and indeed with 

 the exception of shape in the sori, they agree in all respects with 

 Polypodium. The word Meniscium is said to be derived from mene, 

 the moon, in allusion to the shape of the sori. Antrophyum (from 

 antron, a cavern, and phyo, to grow, in reference to its native 

 place of habitation), has latterly found two representatives in 

 Australia in the species A. plantagineum and A. semicostatum, 



