DESCRIPTIONS OF THE SPECIES 
133 
52. Athyrium Schimperi Moug. 
Plate 41. Nat. size, b Fertile pinnule, enlarged. 
Rhizome wide-creeping, slender, with long brown scales. 
Frond firmly herbaceous ovate-lanceolate, pointed, three to 
four inches broad, one to one and a half feet long, and with 
a stout pink-tinted stipe, six inches long, which is paleaceous 
at the base, but nearly naked above ; pinnae deltoid, pointed 
widest at the base, one to two inches long, one inch broad, 
with six to ten pairs of distinct, deltoid, or ovate oblong 
pinnules. Pinnules cut to the mid-rib into four to six pairs 
of oblong toothed segments, somewhat confluent above. Sori 
longish, curved above; lower pinnae considerably reduced, and 
more distant. 
Athyrium Schimperi Moug. Fee, Gen. 187, 1850-52; C. Chr. Ind. 
146. 
Asplenium Schimperi. A. Br. in Schweinf. Beitr. 224 ; Wood, Natal 
Ferns , 24; Buchanan’s List, No. 75; Kuhn, Fil. Afr. 116; Hk. 
and Bkr, Syn. Fil. 489 ; Sim, Ferns of S. Afr., 1st ed., 16 1. 
Tropical Africa, extending to Natal, where it grows about 
exposed but damp rocks in Nottingham and Karkloof districts, 
and in bush at Cathkin, 4000 to 5000 feet alt.; also at Umpu- 
mulo, 2500 feet (Buchanan). Also in Transkei, Zuurbergen, 
5500 ft (R. Schlechter, 6585). 
53. Athyrium scandicinum (Willd.) Presl. 
Plate 42. Nat. size. 
Crown sub-erect, paleaceous. Frond herbaceous, tender, 
glabrous, ovate or ovate-deltoid, two to four feet long, eight 
to fourteen inches broad, with a green, slightly scaly stipe, 
six to twelve inches long. Pinnae ovate-lanceolate, six to 
ten inches long, one and a half to three inches broad, with 
attenuated points, and with ten to twenty bluntly ovate- 
deltoid pinnules, which are cut to the rachis into five to ten 
pairs *of rounded, oblong, toothed segments. Sori oblong, 
curved, generally one to each segment. 
This species varies considerably in size, and Schlechtendal’s 
figure shows a pinna twelve inches long, four inches broad, 
and more distinctly cut than most specimens. 
