44 



THE FERN BULLETIN 



the unusual forms that press their claims for recogni- 

 tion as good members of this genus. In the begin- 

 ning, especially, we find what are clearly bracken-like 

 plants with free veins and others with the veins 

 anastomosing, and in the latter division the meshes of 

 the veins or areolae may or may not include a free 

 veinlet. Along with these differences we find numer- 

 ous differences of structure and outline until we ap- 

 preciate the fact that the systematist has found it nec- 

 essary to make several different sections of a large 

 genus, and are not surprised that various fern students 

 have been inclined to consider some of the groups to 

 be good genera themselves. Our own bracken 

 (Pteris aquilina) under such a ruling is no longer a 

 Pteris. With four other species it forms the section 

 Paesia because it possesses a second fungacious in- 

 dusium. For this reason it is sometimes placed in the 

 genus Pteridium in this country. This is not usually 

 countenanced, but not so much objection is made at 

 the separation of the group Doryo pteris for in this 

 group the fronds are arrow-shaped or half pedate with 

 many anastomosing veinlets and all the plants are 

 quite small. There are about ten different species re- 

 garded as belonging to this group. Of these, five are 

 found in the American tropics and the others occur in 

 the Hawaiian Islands, the Philippines and Australia 

 — a wide distribution for a group so small. In this 

 magazine for April 1908, we illustrated one of the 

 common species of the American tropics named Dory- 

 opteris pedata and we give herewith an illustration of 

 a species from the other side of the world. This is 

 Doryo pteris hid ens collected in Luzon, Philippine Is- 

 lands by D. Le Roy Topping to whose kindness we 

 are indebted for the specimen from which the figure 



