209 



Granada, Holton (Ocana, elev. 4000 ft.), Sc/ilim, E. Otto, Purdie (large speci- 

 mens). Venezuela, Fendler,ii.9\. Galapagos, Cuming, n. 107, Capt. Wood, R.N. , 

 East Indies, Mountains of Dindighul {ex Herb. Wight), included in Wall. Cat. 

 n. 87/4, and mixed with Pella^a geraniifolia ; Nilghiii, Rev. E. Johmon. Tropical 

 New Holland, Broicn. — A well-known and very variable Fern, and so closely allied 

 in form and general appearance to the more compound state of Pelltva geraniifolia 

 that the two can hardly with certainty be distinguished without recourse to the 

 venation, and that is often ditticult, from its being immersed, and from the 

 thick and very opaque nature of the perfect fronds. Raddi has given good 

 tigures of several of the varieties of Pf. pedata, and many more might be 

 adduced. Indeed they are of every intermediate grade, from cordate or ovato- 

 cordate, quite undivided, some with the two bbes at the base, to three-lobed, 

 almost regularly five-lobed, with the lobes acute or acuminate, and entire or 

 more or less deeply tripartite, having the two lateral divisions bipartite (so 

 as to take a pedate form, with the intermediate or terminal division three- or 

 five-lobed), till at length we come to the more compound state considered to 

 constitute the Pt. pedata of Linnaeus, while the less divided is the Pt. palmata 

 of Willdenow. In the former state, the terminal or intermediate primary lobe 

 or division is usually narrowed and cuneate at its base. When its base is 

 broader and more gradually decurrent with the lateral lobes, with a broader 

 and more rounded sinus, it then becomes the P. varians of Raddi (t. 64), 

 from which the Pt. collina, Raddi (t. 65. f. 1), cannot be distinguished. The 

 ultimate lobes, or segments, vary extremely in length and breadth, as the fronds 

 themselves do in size. One of our specimens from Rio (Gardner, n. 37) 

 measures 12 inches in the breadth and 10 inches in the length of the frond, 

 and the ultimate lobes are from an inch to an inch and a half in dia- 

 meter. 



80. Pt. (Litobrochia) decipiens, Hook. ; caudex short tliick 

 ascending, fronds fasciculate subcoriaceous opaque pedately 

 cordate in circumscription ternately divided quite to the 

 rachis all the divisions deeply bipinnatifid, the primary 

 segments lanceolate subfalcate acuminate, those of the ter- 

 minal division opposite cuneately decurrent at the base and 

 there entire (not lobed), those on the lowest side longer 

 than those on the superior side and more divided, ultimate 

 segments triangular-oblong obtuse, sori continuous, veins 

 uniting and anastomosing so as to form large lax oblong 

 areoles and arcs next the costa, stipes hispid at the base 

 and as well as the rachises black-ebeneous. — Pt. pedata, 

 Hook, and Am. in Bot. of Beech. Voy. p. 107 {excL the 

 synonyms). Doryopteris pedata, Brackenridge, in Fil. U. S. 

 Expl. Exp. p. 403 {as far only as the specimens from the 

 '"'Sandwich Islands" are concerned). Pteris Beecheyana, 

 Nobis, MSS., and noticed under Pelleea geraniifolia, supra, 

 p. 133. 



Hab. Oahu, Sandwich Islands, Lag and Collie, in Beeckeg's Voy., Seemann 

 in the Voy. of the Herald, Brackenridge. — This I had at one time believed 

 to be indentical with Pelleea geraniifolia, so exactly does it resemble it in habit 

 and composition ; and then, finding it to have unquestionably anastomosing 



