70 
THE 
FERN 
WORLD OF AUSTRALIA. 
without scales, entire on the lower ones with a short lateral lobe on 
one or both sides, the upper ones confluent. Veins obliquely- 
diverging from the midrib. Sori continuous round the margin 
except at the base, the margin of the frond at first turned over 
them, but afterwards flat and not altered in consistence. N. 
Australia, Port Darwin; Queensland, Endeavour River. 
N. vellea, R. Br. Rhizome short. Fronds tufted, mostly 
about six inches high but sometimes double that height, oblong- 
lanceolate in outline, pinnate or bipinnate, with a hairy rhachis. 
Pinnas half to one inch long, deeply pinnatifid or pinnate, some- 
what thick, green and hispid above, very densely woolly hirsute and 
often ferruginous underneath, the lobes or segments ovate or 
rounded, very obtuse. Sori at the end of the forked veins forming 
an almost continuous narrow line round the margin. Port Darwin 
and several other places in N. Australia ; many localities in 
Northern Queensland ; a few places in the interior of N. S. Wales 
and South Australia ; also Fraser's Range, in Western Australia. 
N. distans, R. Br. Rhizome short, erect, forming a close knot. 
Fronds three to six inches high, about an inch broad, ferruginous 
hirsute above, paleaceous beneath with lanceolate scales, pinnate or 
bipinnate, primary pinna? petiolulate often opposite or nearly so, 
erect-patent, the lowest pair often distant, pinnules obtuse, margins 
recurved. Sori continuous along the margin. Common in all the 
AustraKan Colonies, usually met with on rocks in more exposed 
situations than most ferns. The species scarcely differs from N. 
vellea to which it had better perhaps been added as a form. 
N. fragilis, Hook. Rhizome horizontal, rather thick, scaly. 
Fronds broadly deltoid in outline, in some specimens one to one 
and a half inch long, on slender stipes twice as long, in others 
three inches long and broad, with firmer black stipes twice or 
thrice as long, pinnate with numerous small deeply pinnatifid pin- 
nules, the ultimate lobes under one line long, each one bearing a 
sorus large in proportion, partial rhachis and under side of the 
lobes hispid with a few rigid hairs or bristles. North Australia, 
Fitzmaurice River and Port Darwin. 
XXXV. — Grammitis, Swartz. 
Rhizome short, tufted, or sometimes creeping to a great' length. 
Fronds pinnate pinnatifid or entire. Veins forked free or reticulate 
Sori linear or oblong, on veins, diverging from the midrib, scattered 
or crowded usually in fines, hke writing, whence the name, from 
gramme, writing. 
G. Reynoldsii, F. v. M. Rhizome creeping. Fronds in the 
few specimens seen three to six inches long, simply pinnate. 
Pinnae in distant pairs, broadly ovate or orbicular, obtuse, entire, 
about half an inch long, thick and densely covered on both sides with 
hair-hke scales. Sori buried under the scales, oblong or shortly 
linear, transverse and distinct but closely crowded near the margin 
