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DESCRIPTION OP A FERN (BLEGHNVM OABTILA- 



GINEUM), NEW TO THE TASMANIAN LIST. 



By R. M. Johnston, F.L.S. 



By the kindness of Mr. Leonard Rqdway I have had the 

 opportunity given me for making a critical examination of a 

 new fern discovered recently at George's Bay by Mr. G. K. 

 Hinsby. Both of these gentlemen are well known as 

 industrious collectors of plants, more especially as regards 

 our little known Fungi, and we may hope to gain from them 

 at some early day further valuable additions to our knowledge 

 of the Cryptogamic plants of this island. 



The new fern submitted to me by this gentleman might at 

 first sight be readily mistaken for some of the abnormal 

 forms of Lomaria discolor, where, at times, several of the 

 pinnae of the fertile fronds are less contracted or enrolled 

 upon each other ; but a closer examination showed that the 

 lines of sori were arranged differently, being continuous, and 

 situated close and parallel on each side of the costule, with a 

 membranous indusium opening from under the costule 

 outwards, and thus answering exactly to the generic charac- 

 teristics of Bleehnum. This genus is very closely allied to 

 Lomaria, but in the latter (whose linear sori are placed 

 nearer the margin, and opening on the inner side next to 

 costule), the sori at length covers the whole of the under 

 surface, and these are themselves often closely enwrapped by 

 the marginal borders of pinnae which sometimes assumes a 

 cord-like appearance by the extreme flexure. The margin of 

 the species of Bleehnum about to be described are not so 

 characterised, the sori only at length covering the costule 

 and middle of pinnae ; the margins are not reflexed. 



Still further examination showed that the species discovered 

 by Mr. Hinsby was in all respects identical with Bleehnum 

 Cartilagineum, Swartz, a species hitherto only known from 

 the mainland of Australia, where it is found in similar 

 situations, i.e., along creek-sides and borders of scrubs, in 

 southern Queensland, and New South Wales, and in several 

 places in Gippsland, Victoria. The addition of a new genus 

 as well as a new species to our list of Tasmanian Ferns, is of 

 the very greatest interest, and now that we know of its 

 existence locally, I am convinced it will soon be discovered 

 in other localities, where possibly it has been overlooked or 

 confounded with the everywhere abundant Lomaria discolor. 

 I have a vague idea (now that I have examined the George's 

 Bay specimen), that I have seen the same fern on the banks 



