DESCRIPTIONS OF N.Z. FERNS. 89 



This fern is found in India, Malaya, Australia, Tasmania, and some of the Pacific 

 Islands. It is only known to have been .found in New Zealand as far south as Nelson, 

 and is more common north of Auckland than in an\' other part of the North Island, 

 though rarely met with even there. It is easily cultivated and spreads rapidly, but 

 requires a little warmth and shelter. It likes light soil and leaf mould, but does not 

 need much water. 



PELLCEA ROTUNDIFOLIA. (Pel-lee-a ro-tun-dif-o-le-a.) 



PLATE XIV., No. 2. 



This plant creeps less than the preceding, and has rather a stouter rhizome, in 

 proportion to the size of its fronds. The stipites are numerous, erect, more or less 

 bristly or scalv, dark brown or black and often nearly as long as the frond. Rachis 

 similar to the stipes. Fronds seldom more than twelve inches long, oblong or tapering 

 and pinnate. The pinnae are alternate, round, oval, or pointed, more shortly and less 

 distinftly stalked than those of P. falcata, and sometimes even narrowly sessile. The 

 lower pinnae are sometimes auricled or lobed, and I have even found fronds in which 

 they were divided into three distinct pinnules. Sori forming short broad lines on both 

 sides of the pinnae, and soon covering the involucres. Colour olive green ; texture 

 harshly coriaceous. Also called Platyloma rotundifolia. 



Abundant in most parts of New Zealand on dry hill-sides, and in crevices of rocks, 

 and found also in Norfolk and Chatham Islands. I am not at all certain that it is not 

 merely a form of P. falcata, for though the tvpical forms are very distin6l, yet they 

 seem to pass into each other by imperceptible gradations. The chief difference lies 

 in the stipes and rachis, being smooth in one plant and bristly in the other. 

 P. rotundifolia is easilv cultivated like the preceding one, but in both the pinnae are very 

 apt to drop off, leaving the stipes and rachis as a mere barren stalk. 



GENUS PTERIS. (Pter-ris.) 

 So called from the Greek word Pteron a wing. It is, in fact, the Greek name for 

 bracken, and just as the term " fern " which is commonly applied to bracken, has 

 come to be extended to all filices, so the word "pteris" is used botanically, in combination 

 with something else, to express many other ferns; though standing alone, it signifies 

 merely the bracken and the plants closely allied to it. 



The genus is chara6lerised by having marginal sori, which are linear and 

 continuous, and arranged on a slender thread-like receptacle in the axis of the 

 involucres. These last are of the same shape as the sorus, and formed of a thin 

 continuation of the margin of the frond, turned back so as at first quite to cover the 

 sorus, but afterwards more or less opened inwards, so as to show the capsules. Three 

 sub-genera Eupteris, Poesia and Litobrochia are represented in New Zealand. In 

 Eupteris the veins are all free, and the involucres single. 

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