G YMNO GRA MME. 



259 



G. Laucheana — Lauch-e-a'-na (Lauche's). This and its various forms 

 are all varieties of G. calomelanos chrysophylla. 



G. (Eugymnogramme) Lechleri — Eu-gym-nog-ram'-me ; Lech-le'-ri 

 (Lechler's), Mettenius. 

 A stove species, of small dimensions, native of Peru, with sharp-pointed, 

 spear-shaped fronds 1ft. long, 3in. broad, and three or four times divided 

 half-way to the midrib. The rachis (stalk of the leafy portion) is straight 

 and densely clothed with bristly hairs. The leaflets are stalked as well as 

 their leaiits, which are oblong or egg-shaped and blunt. Both surfaces are 

 shortly hairy, and the sori (spore masses) are disposed at the base of the final 

 lobes. — Rooker, Synopsis Filicum, p. 516. 



G. (Eugymnogramme) leptophylla — Eu-gym-nog-ram'-me ; lep-toph- 

 yF-la (slender -leaved), Desvaux. 



This small-growing species, which widely differs from nearly all the 

 other species of Ferns in . being an annual, possesses an uncommon and 

 nearly unlimited range of habitat. From Hooker we learn that, besides being 

 a native of many parts of Europe, it is also found wild in Abyssinia, Cape 

 Colony, Persia, the Neilgherries, New South Wales, Tasmania, New Zealand, 

 the Andes of Mexico, and Ecuador. Beddome also states that it is abundant 

 on the Neilgherries and Mahableshwar Hills, Sattara Fort walls (Bombay 

 Presidency), that it has also been collected between Ootacamund and 

 Kotagherry, and that in these localities, it only appears during the rainy 

 season. From Lowe we learn that G. leptophylla, the " Annual Maidenhair," 

 is indigenous in the warmer parts of Europe, that it is found in France, 

 Brittany, Provence, Italy, Naples, Sicily, Germany, Spain, the Canaries, the 

 Azores, and Jersey. Lowe significantly adds, " the interest in this little 

 plant is increased from the circumstance that it is the solitary British 

 representative of this interesting genus." 



Although it had long been known as a native of the Southern Continent 

 of Europe, its adjacent islands, and Madeira, G. leptophylla was not until 

 1852 included among the British Flora. The first information that we 

 possess of its being a native of the British Islands dates from that year, 

 when Mr. N. B. Ward found it growing wild in various localities in Jersey, 

 besides near St. Aubyn's and St. Lawrence, "where it was growing on moist 



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