DESCRIPTIONS OF THE SPECIES 
1 13 
bush ; midland districts, Inanda inland (Wood) ; Maritzburg ; 
Umpumulo, 2000 to 3000 feet (Buchanan); near Tugela River 
(Gueinzius) ; Buccleuch (W. Leighton) ; Zwaartkop and Sweetwaters 
(T. R. Sim). 
Rhodesia.— Umtali (Mrs Bennett); Gwaai (J. Sim); Mt Pene Forest, 
7000 ft (Swynnerton, 815). 
Genus 9. Aspidium Swartz. 
Sori round with a central stalk supporting the circular peltate 
indusium, which covers the capsules. Veins anastomosing 
freely. 
Aspidium as restricted by Christensen contains 29 species, 
widely dispersed, of which only one comes within our district. 
Aspidium, as limited in our first edition, is now placed in 
Polystichum. 
35. Aspidium cicutarium (Linn.) Sw. 
Plate 25. Part of lower pinna, nat. size. 
Frond deltoid, three-pinnatifid, glabrous, thinly herbaceous 
but firm, with three to six pairs of pinnae, and a pinnatifid 
apex. Lower pinnae opposite, eighteen inches long, twelve 
inches broad, deltoid, stalked, cut to the rachis below, and 
to near the rachis above, into numerous, alternate pinnules, 
of which the upper are lanceolate, increasing from the point 
downward to six inches in length, one-half to one and a half 
inches broad, tapering to the acute point, and cut two to 
three lines deep into rounded oblique lobes three lines broad ; 
while the lower are six to nine inches long, three to four 
inches broad, and pinnatifid like the upper part of the pinna 
into rather distant, lanceolate, deeply crenate pinnules half- 
inch broad, and two to three inches long. Other pinnae 
gradually smaller upward. Mid-ribs distinct throughout, 
other veins fine but anastomosing freely into rather irregular 
areolae. Sori very large, terminal on a free veinlet in the 
centre of the larger areolae, and forming a straight line near 
the mid-rib in the simple pinnules, one sorus below each lobe 
of the margin; in the pinnatifid pinnules the sori occupying 
a similar position in the segments and absent from near the 
main mid-rib. Stipe and rachis brownish, shining. A vari- 
S. F. S. A. 
