Puate 3. 
HYMENOLEPIS sprcata, Pr.; var. brachystachys. 
Serpent's Tongue Hypolepis ; short-spiked var. 
HYMENOLEPIS spicata; caudex creeping, scaly, tuberculate; fronds approxi- 
mate, shortly petiolate, articulated upon a bulb-like tubercle, lanceolate, 
coriaceo-carnose, contracted at the apex into a linear appendage, varying 
much in length, and soriferous; veins copiously anastomosing, areoles with 
free veinlets. 
Var. macrostachys; fronds narrow, and spike much elongated. 
HyMENOLEPIS spicata. Presi, Epimel. Bot. p. 159. J. Sm. Kew Ferns, p.1; 
Cult. Ferns, p. 1. Hook. Exot. Ferns, t. 88. 
HyMENOoLEPIs ophioglossoides. Kaul. Enum. Fil. p. 146. t.1.f. 9 (figure bad). 
Blume, Enum. Fil. Jav. p. 200. Kaze. in Schh, Fil. Suppl. p.99.t. 47. f. 1. 
Hymeno.eris revoluta. Bl. En. Fil. Jav. p. 201. Kaze. in Schk. Fil. Suppl. 
p. 101. 4.47. f. 2. Presl, Epimel. Bot. p. 160. 
Hya o.eris ophioglossoides and revoluta. Kze. in Linnea, v. 23. pt. 2. p. 258. 
Metten. Fil. Hort. Lips. p. 28. 
AcRostTicHuM spicatum. Linn. Suppl. p. 444. Cav. Prel. 1801. 2. 569. Sm. 
Ic. ined. t. 49. 
Onoc.za spicata. Sw. Syn. Fil. p. 110 and 3038. 
ScuizHa spicata. Sm. Act. Taur. v. 5. p. 53. 
Lomartia spicata. Willd. Sp. Pl. 5. p. 289. 
GyMNoPTERIS spicata. Presi, Tent. Pterid. p. 244. t. 11. f. 7. 
Var. brachystachys ; fronds broader, spike short, very obtuse (Tas. Nostr. 3). 
Has. India, especially the islands of the Hastern Archipelago, and the Pacific 
Islands, Ceylon, Bourbon, Mauritius, Assam and Khasya, Churra and Sik- 
kim, Philippine Islands, Java, Penang, Society and Fiji Islands, and Solo- 
mon’s Group; Brisbane, North Australia. 
(See ‘ Exotic Ferns,’ t. Ixxxviti., for more particular localities of the species.) 
The ordinary form of this plant is well represented and fully 
described in the ‘Exotic Ferns’ above quoted, and from garden 
specimens which differ in no respect from native ones. Another 
form, that here given, is also cultivated at Kew from plants re- 
ceived from the Leipzig Garden, under the name of H. ophio- 
glossoides, but from what locality is not stated. The numerous 
fronds are very uniform in their great breadth, and in the singu- 
larly short and broad spike; so different at first sight from the 
ordinary state of the plant, that persons familiar with the Fern 
JANUARY lst, 1861. 
