-10 CHAEACTERS OF TKIBES AND GENERA. 



or connected, this species, with several others, inckiding 

 Goniopteris Sandvice)ise and its allies, seems to form a 

 natural group, which, with Lastrea villosa, may, on the 

 character of general habit, be viewed as forming a natural 

 genus of snb-arboroid Ferns. 



109.— MEsocHLJiNA, B. Br. (1838). 



Sj.ilHvrosttjiJiaiws, J. Sm. (1838); NejiJiroJium sjj. 3ool\ 

 Sp. Fil. 



Vernation fasciculate, erect. Fronds 2 to 4 feet high, 

 blpinnatifid. Veins costa=form, pinnate ; the lower pair of 

 venules anastomosing, the others free, parallel. Beeepteieles 

 medial, elongated. Sori oblong' linear. Indiisiuni oblong, 

 attached longitudinally on the centre of tho receptacle, 

 having sporangia on its axis on each side, its margin free. 



Type. Foh/podium cillosiim and F. caudigertim, Wall. 



Illust. Hook, and Bauer, Gen. Fil., t. 24; Hook. Fil. 

 Exot,, t. 62 ; Moore Ind. Fil., p. 43, B ; J. Sm. Ferns, 

 Brit, and For,, fig. 66. 



Obs. — This genus was first noticed by Brown in Hors- 

 field's " Planta Javanica," and about the same time de- 

 scribed by me in Hooker and Bauer's "Genera Filicum" 

 under the name Spharostephanos, Later observations have 

 led me to view it as scarcely distinct from Neplirodittm, 

 with which the species agree in halnt. The only diflerence 

 that Brown and myself considered as generic consists in 

 the sori being obloug linear, and furnished with an 

 elongated indusium attached along the centre of the sorus, 

 having- the appearance of being double, like that of some 

 species of Athijrinm, but in j\reschhrna it is in a single 

 piece, and cannot be viewed otherwise than as a lengthened 

 reniform indusium of Ncplirodium fitted to the lengthened 



