Ferns of British India and Ceylon. 421 



inches long, densely covered with reddish setaceous scales, fronds 

 linear-lanceolate to rhomboid-lanceolate 1-2 inches long, covered on 

 both sides with numerous hair-like scales, fertile fronds broad ovate, 

 smaller than the sterile ones. Sw. Syn. FiL p. 10. Bedd. F. S. I. 

 t. 213. Acrostichum piloseloides, var. I spathulatum. Hook. Sp. Fil. 

 v. 228. 



Ceylon, about Newera Elya, and in the southern provinces. 



(Also in Tropical America and West Indies ; Natal and Masca- 

 reen Islands ; and Tristan d'Acunha.) 



GENUS LXXXIL— STENOCHLiENA. (J?. Sm.) 



(Stenos, narrow; chloena, cloak ; the narrow involute margin.) 



Fronds simply pinnate, the fertile contracted and very narrow, the 

 sterile with the habit of Lomaria; veins simple or forked, fine and close, 

 generally quite free to the margin, or rarely the two forks or even 

 two separate veins anastomose ; stipes adherent to the rhizome ; pinna? 

 articulate with the rachis. (In palustre, the rachis or costa of the 

 sterile pinnae is winged, particularly towards the apex, which wing 

 has been called an obscure transverse vein, anastomosing in loops ; 

 the same occurs in Pteris patens, and some Athyriums (very apparent 

 in Athy. fimbriatum, var. sphoeropteroides) and it can scarcely be 

 called a true vein. 



1. Stenochl.ena palustre. {Linn, under Poly podium.) Rhi- 

 zome scandent, (often reaching the tops of the highest trees), fronds 

 glabrous, shining, of hard texture, pinnate, 1-4 feet long, pinnae 

 articulated numerous, alternate or opposite, lanceolate acuminate, 

 pungently serrate towards the apex, oblique at the base, and furnished 

 with a marginal gland on the upper edge, 5-10 inches long, 1-1I 

 inch broad, fertile fronds very much contracted ; veins simple or 

 forked, generally free to the thickened margin, rarely the forks or 

 two separate veins anastomose in the middle of, or towards the 

 margin of the pinnae ; rachis of sterile pinnae winged, particularly 

 towards the margin, and forming a pseudo vein parallel with it 



