222 POLYPODIUM, § EUPOLYI'ODIUM. 



131. P. (Eupolypodium) aUernifolium, Hook.; cauclex?, 

 stipites aggregated 1-H inch long slender clothed as is the 

 whole plant with spreading soft silky hairs, fronds 2-3-10 

 feet (!) long lax and flaccid-membranaceous pendent linear 

 shortly acuminate moderately attenuated at the base pinnated 

 throughout in the most regularly alternate maimer, pinnae 

 distant horizontal long ciliated one inch long almost exactly 

 pyramidal that is from a broad adnate base ^ of an inch 

 wide quite entire gradually tapering to a moderately acute 

 point the sides uniform and equal or with the upper base 

 only slightly rounded no way decurrent, pinnae at the apex 

 and base small triangular, costule very slender black when 

 viewed between the eye and the light flexuose, veins quite 

 slender black patent always simple bearing the globose sorus 

 at the apex rather nearer the costule than the margin, rachis 

 fihform flexuose. (Tab. CCLXXVII. A.) 



Ilab. Ecuador, occurring abundantly on the trunks and branches of trees, at 

 elevations between 3000 and 10,000 feet, near Esnieraldas, and between Cuenca 

 and Guayaquil, fronds very long, occasionally met with of the length of 10 feet, 

 Jameson, Hartweg, n. 1496. — Remarkable as is this plant, and truly pinnate from 

 the base to the suiniiiit of its long fronds, and peculiar as is the form of the 

 pinnffi, I yet publish it with some doubt, and have, indeed, hesitated whether 

 it should not be referred to P. cultratum ; the more so as Mettenius has sent me 

 a frond of cultratum, Metten. Polypod. p. 47 ( = /'■ susjjensum of his Fil. Lech- 

 lerianffi), possessing characters common to both ; but the much larger size of our 

 P. alternifolium, the pyramidal form of the equal-sided pinnre, with their broad 

 adnate bases, (distant from each other by the diameter of their base, together 

 with their regular alternate insertion,) give the Fern a very peculiar appearance. 



132. p. (Eupolypodium) semiadnntum. Hook. ; caudex 

 small short ferruginous villose, stipites 1-2-3 inches long 

 filiform black and patenti-villous as is the rachis, fronds pen- 

 dent coriaceo-membranaceous 10-16 inches long ^-1 inch 

 wide linear-oblong acuminate attenuated below pinnated, 

 pinnae rather distant ovate or oblong-ovate obtuse or rarely 

 acuminated villous beneath and ciliated with long hairs at the 

 margin crenate or obtusely serrated the base contracted and 

 above a little produced, costule slender and forked, veins 

 moderately conspicuous, superior branch sorifcrous, sori four 

 or five on each side the costule between it and the margin. 

 —Hook. Ic. Plant, t. 948 [or Cent, of Ferns, t. 48). P. re- 

 clinatum. Brack. Fil. U. S. Expl. Exp. p. 46. 



Ilab. On trunks of trees. Pilzhum, and near Pasto, Andes of Quito, Jameson, 

 n. 46, 77, and 198. Organ Mountains, Brazil, on trees, Gardner, n. 112. Rio, 

 Brackenridge. — The great peculiarity of this Polypodium, among the group to 

 which it belongs, is the length of the very flaccid frond, and the numerous and 



