CHRISTENSEN, ]SEW FERNS FROM MADAGASCAR. 7 



Closely allied to A. Gautieri Hook. sp. 3 t. 184 from the 

 island of Nossi-bé (Comoros), of which I have an authentical 

 specimen. Originally I considered our new species a large 

 variety of A. Gautieri, with which it has the simple sterile 

 leaves in common, still now I think it the best to treat it 

 as a distinct species, different from A. Gautieri by its very 

 long-stalked fertile leaves that have a very long, linear-acu- 

 minate terminal pinna. The short-stalked sterile leaves re- 

 semble as to shape and size very much those of A. Gautieri, 

 but in the latter species their lamina is decurrent at base. 

 In one specimen is present a sterile leaf, which is long-stalked 

 and bears 5 lateral pinnas below the terminal one, but this 

 is, however, not long-linear but short and broad as the simple 

 sterile leaves. That specimen I have before with doubt re- 

 ferred to A. pachysorum Bak. Journ. of Bot. 1891: 4, also 

 from Madagascar, although Baker describes the side pinnae 

 as acuminate, and the sori as running from the midrib nearly 

 to the edge. Baker, also, does not mention the differently 

 shaped sterile leaves, and I believe, therefore, that our species 

 is not the same as A. pachysorum. 



Aspleiiium liueatum Sw. subsp, supraauritum C. Chr. 



PI. 2, Fig. 9. 



Differt ab omnibus formis A. lineati a cl. Cordemoy 

 (Revue generale de Bot. vol. VIII: 85 pi. V — VI) depictis 

 pinnis omnibus vel inferioribus basi superiore lobo (rarius 

 pinnula soluta) magno ovato obtuse dentato instructis. Pinnis 

 6 — 12 cm longis, 1 Vs — 2 cm latis, acuminatis, grosse duplicato- 

 dentatis, dentibus obtusis. Venis furcatis vel interdum bi- 

 furcatis. Lamina apice interdum prolifera. 



Madagascaria: Moramanga, 18. 10. 1912, nr 476. 



Provisionally I prefer to place this AsjAeniuiiißMnaev A. 

 lineatum Sw. as a subspecies, although it is probable that it 

 really belongs to a distinct species. But if Cordemoy is 

 right in placing all the different looking forms found by 

 him in Reunion under a single species, A.lineatum,>o\xv new 

 form must naturally be referred to the same. It approaches 

 A. affine Sw. in cutting and proliferous apex. 



