given to unravel the confusion. It is a Linnean and Swartzian 
plant, and the figure of Plumier, with which ours sufficiently 
accords, lias been our guide. No good and more recent figure 
has been given of it, that I am aware; for the P. pectinatum, of 
Schkuhr, Fil. t. 17. £. 2, is by most botanists now considered a 
distinct species, having the base of the frond broad and truncated, 
not attenuated, and decurrent, as it were, on the stipes. Unfortu- 
nately I have various intermediate states, which would appear to 
unite them. Certainly, too, my herbarium possesses other speci- 
mens, which I cannot distinguish from this, amongst them a plant 
of Sieber, “ Flora Mixta, n. 384,” which has the veins anastomo- 
sing, so as to form large costular areoles, each including the sori- 
ferous venule. ‘This Polypodium of Sieber, Mettenius refers to P. 
Otites, but in his character of that he does not notice the union of 
the veins: an authentic specimen from the latter of his P. Otites 
(Moritz, n. 555) has entirely free veins. Grisebach remarks 
under this Fern, “Species contra eos, qui ex nervatura genera 
Filicum artificialia derivarunt, grave argumentum dat, nam ex- 
tant forme ubi venee juxta marginem pinnarum hinc inde ansas 
formant, aliz verum pinne dichotomiam liberam ostendunt.” 
Hence, too, Mr. J. Smith has been led to refer this plant at 
one time to his Goniophlebium, at another to Eupolypodium. 
P. lomariaforme, Kze., from an authentic specimen in my her- 
barium, is probably our plant with the venation anastomosing. 
P. Paridisee, Fisch. and Langsd., P. Struthionis, L., P. Plu- 
mula, Willd, P. Schkuhriit, Rad., and even P. curvatum, and 
perhaps some others, require a careful study and comparison, be- 
fore they can really and with confidence be pronounced distinct. 
Puate 10. Polypodinm (Ewpolypodium) pectinatum, L.,—natural size. Fig. 1. 
Portion of a fertile segment, with sori,—magnified. 
