Puate 9. 
PLATYCERIUM Airuioricum, Hook. 
Aithiopian Stay’ s-Horn Fern. 
PLatycERIUM Aithiopicum ; fronds ample, when young canescent all over with 
stellated, sessile and pedicellate hairs; sterile ones bifarious, suborbicular, 
imbricated, variously lobed and sinuated, subcoriaceo-membrauaceous ; fertile 
ones drooping, carnoso-coriaceous, canescent, beneath shortly petiolated, 
broad-cuneate in circumscription, bifurcate ; segments all divergent, ultimate 
ones sharply acuminated ; sorus dark brown, nearly of the shape of the letter 
V, situated beneath the sinus of the ultimate fork. 
NeEvuRoPLATYcERos Athiopicus. Pluk. Almagest. p. 151. t. 429. f. 2 (young and 
very imperfect fertile frond). Fée, Hist. des Acrost. p. 108. t. 64 (sterile 
Sronds erect, instead of pendent). 
Acrosticuum stemaria. Palisot de Beauv. Fl. @ Oware et du Benin, v. 1. p. 2. 
t. 2. (very much reduced figure, and with sterile frond erect). 
Piatycertum Stemmaria. Desv. in Act. Soc. Linn. de Paris, v. 6. p. 213. 
AcrosticuuM alcicorne. Sw. Syn. Fil. p. 12, in part (not Br.). Schk. Fil. v.1. 
t. 2 (copied from Plukenet). 
Has. Tropical Western Africa, ‘ Aithiopia”’ (Plukene¢), Oware, on old Man- 
grove-trees only, Palisot de Beauvois. Guinea Coast, Afzelius, Leprieur. 
Senegambia, Heudelot, n. 764 (Herb. Nostr.). Sierra Leone, Vogel, Cap- 
tain Babington, Dr. Kirk, etc. Niger, probably abundant, Vogel, Barter 
(at Idda, on rocks). Fernando Po, Prince’s Island, Nun river, Gustav Mann, 
Vogel, Barter. Tropical Africa, south of the Line, Dr. Curror. 
Although an extremely distinct species of Platycerium, this is 
a very variable one in its different stages of growth, which will 
easily account for the different representations given by different 
authors. Plukenet, the first author who brought this plant into 
notice, had only a small, half-developed fertile frond in view, 
too young to bear fructification, or even to have taken its perfect 
form. Palisot de Beauvois and Fée have erred in figuring the 
fertile fronds erect, as in Platycerium alcicorne, Br., and I should 
have erred in the same way, probably, had it not been my good 
fortune to have a fine living plant before me, where they are as 
pendent as in P/. grande, biforme, and Wallichit. We have in- 
deed long cultivated the species in our fern-stove, but never had it 
fructify in perfection, till it was exposed to great dampness, and 
heat and the influence of steam. We regret that we are confined 
to an octavo plate in its representation, and it is only a portion of 
MARCH lst, 1861. 
