THE FERNS OF NORTH-WESTERN INDIA. 
53 
there was an interval of 2,500 feet between the upper limit of that species 
and the lower limit of what he called N. remotum , and discussed the differences 
between those two ferns, arriving at the conclusion that altogether they 
indicated specific distinction. I cannot see even the remotest resemblances 
between them. N. Blanfordii i though there may be thought to be some 
similarity in the details of cutting, does not, as a whole, suggest the European, 
plant, the pinnae of which, as its name denotes, increase in distance down- 
wards until they are three inches apart at the base : whereas in the Himalayan 
plant the lowest pinnae are not more “remote,” and it is smaller than the 
British plant which, like the Continental European one, is believed to be a 
hybrid between N. F.-mas. and N. spinulosum , Desv. Mr. Barnes, of Beeth- 
waite Green, Westmoreland, w T ho long ago gave me a frond of N . remotum 
from an original plant received from Mr. Clowes, of Windermere, the dis- 
coverer of the so-called species, told me he believed it to be the above 
indicated hybrid, and that he had found that its spores produced typical F.-mas . 
I demur entirely to Mr. Clarke’s statement that the typical plant figured by 
Hooker, Brit. Ferns, t. 22, is frequent, in the West Himalaya, as I cannot 
find that it at all exi*ts there. When gathering the two plants in the S mla 
Region I did not at first separate, except by size, N. Blanfordii from 
N~. ramosum , Hope (in Jonrn. Bot . 9 Mrrch 1896) ; but I afterwards saw that 
they differed in share and cutting of the fronds. N. Blanfordii is near N. 
F.-mas ; but it has no affinity to N. spinulosum , Desv., which has not been 
got in the Indian Region. In the Journal of Botany, under N. ramosum 
I said — “ Perhaps the nearist convener of this species is N. nemor Us 
(a slip or misprint for N. nem orate ), n. sp., Hope MS., a fern with a more 
limited range, hitherto called N. spinuJosum Desv., var. remota ; but that 
species is never truly bipinnate, and it has always a short stipe and dark- 
coloured scales.” When I thus wrote (in India), I was imperfectly informed 
as to the accepted meaning of the term “bipinnate.” Also I have, in 
publishing, altered the specific name of this fern, because “ nemorale ’* was 
thought to be too near that of a previously described species ; and I can find 
none more appropriate to it than one that will commemorate the name of 
the late Mr. H. F. Blanford. 
Subgenus— -E ttnephbodium. 
29. Nephrodium Papilio, n. sp .—Plants isolated ; caud % erect : 
in old plants subarborescent * st. numerous, stout, rising regularly from round the 
apex of the caudex, very short, almost glabrous ; jr. lanceolate, generally suddenly 
contracted to a long deeply pinnatifid apex or terminal pinna and always 
prolonged downwards, with shorter and shorter auricled piunse, nearly to the 
