Ferns of British India and Ceylon. 



9i 



4. Cheilanthes fragilis. (Hook.) Caudex none except the 

 copious tufted wiry fibres, from which the stipes arise in tufts ; main 

 rachis and slightly scaly stipes (3-5 inches long) clothed with a 

 greyish glandulose tomentum ; fronds of an opaque brownish-green 

 colour, submembranaceous, 8-15 inches long, erect, rather stiff but 

 fragile, oblong-lanceolate, pinnate with the pinnae pinnatifid ; pinnae 

 alternate distant, horizontal up to 2 inches long, pinnatifid nearly to 

 the rachis (which is furnished with subulate scales) ; segments 

 crenated ; lobes obtuse and partially 

 ciliated at the margin ; veins pinnated, 

 simple or forked ; sori approximate 

 roundish ; involucres ciliated, formed 

 of the slightly changed lobes of the 

 margin. Hook. Fil. Exot. t. 96 ; 



Syn. Fil. p. 135. Bedd. F. B. I. 



t. 223. 



Perhaps only a form of No. 3. 

 Moulmein, on limestone rocks. 



5. Cheilanthes varians. (Wall, 

 under Pteris.) Root tufted ; stipes 4-6 

 inches long, slender, ebeneous-glossy, 

 plane and margined on the upper 

 side, obsoletely setose - paleaceous ; 

 fronds sub - membranaceous, glab- 

 rous, about a span long, long-lanceo- 

 late, the pinnatifid apex acuminated, 



pinnated above, bipinnate below ; primary pinnae distant, spreading 

 or a little curved upwards, sessile, superior ones lanceolate, 

 acuminate sinuate -pinnatifid at their base, and somewhat auricled 

 at the upper base, lower ones deltoid acuminate pinnate at their 

 base, pinnatifid acuminated (caudate) in the upper half; pinnules 

 lanceolate acuminate or acute pinnatifid below, the lowest 

 inferior pinnne the longest. Hook. Sp. Fil. ii. p. 89 ; Syn. Fil. 

 p. 136. Bedd. F. S. I. t. 189. 



N'A-7. 

 CHEILANTHES VARIANS. {Wall.) 



