142 Ferns of British India and Ceylon. 
as varieties, as there are intermediate forms from the Himalayas ; they 
both stain the paper they are dried in, a bright pink colour. 
2. AsPLENiuM Griffithianum. {Hook.) Stipes tufted, erect 
short; fronds lanceolate, 4-12 inches long, |— i inch broad, the 
point acuminate, narrowing below very gradually ; the margin 
undulate, crenate; texture subcoriaceous ; veins distant, obscure, 
usually once forked; sori reaching from the midrib two-thirds of 
the way to the margin. Hook. Syn. Fil. 193. Bedd, F.B. I. /. 58. 
Sikkim, below Darjeeling, 4,000 
feet elevation, scarce ; Mishmee ; 
Khasya, 4,000-5,000 feet elevation, 
Mergui and Tavoy. 
There is also, in the Keiv Herbarium, 
a fern from Penang, which quite agrees 
with this, except that it has a slender 
stipe 6-9 inches long. 
* Fronds lobed or pinnatifid. 
3. ASPLENIUM ALTKRNANS. ( Wall.) 
Caudex short, descending, copiously 
rooting, squamose with subulate scales 
as is the very short (rarely an inch 
long) stipe, and base of the costa 
beneath ; fronds csespitose, about a 
span long, chartaceous, very opaque 
pale rusty green beneath, glabrous, 
lanceolate, scarcely acuminate attenuated below, deeply and regularly 
pinnatihd throughout ; lobes ovate or triangular-oblong with wide 
sinuses, obtuse, quite entire; veins subflabellate, all free; sori 
copious on all the lobes in two rows, linear-oblong erect- 
patent, the superior basal one parallel with the costa. Wall. 
Cat. 221. Hook. Sp. Fil. iii. 92. Syn. Fil. p. 194. Bedd. 
FB.I.t. 59. 
N. \V. Himalayas, very common 3,000-9,000 feet elevation. 
ASPLENIUM ENSIFORME. 
[Wallich.) 
