154 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, Vol. XIV 
of which, without the stipes, is 21 £ in. 1. by only 4 in. br.) and with a thick 
erect caudex, I might be disposed to unite the species, bub— “ as at present 
advised” — I must consider them distinct plants. Perhaps the most decided 
difference between both of these species on the one hand, and A. nigripes on 
the other, at least after the shape of the fronds, is the absence in the first- 
mentioned pair of the mass of long, narrow, light brown scales at foot of stipes, 
which is a prominent feature of A. nigripes. The scales in A. tenuifrons are 
dark brown, tapering to a hair point from a broad base ; and though they clothe 
the stipes of young fronds before the fronds uncurl, they soon drop off, leaving 
the stipes quite glabrous, except for one or two inches at the base, which are 
sparingly clothed. A large specimen of A. tenuifrons in Mr. Bliss’s collection 
is quite diplazoid ; and I see a tendency to that form of sorns in other speci- 
mens also. 
Mr. Blanford evidently formed a strong opinion as to the specific difference 
between A. tenuifrons and A. nigripes , and his remarks seem worth quoting in 
full ; but most of what he called A. nigripes, in the Simla Region, was my 
A. Mackinnoni : — 
*•' Mr. Clarke regards this as merely a form of A. nigripes . In this view I cannot 
agree with him ;• differing as it does so greatly in habit and habitat, while neither 
exhibits a great range of variation. It is restricted to well shaded ravines, growing 
in the beds of streams at elevations below 7000 ft. The fronds, numbering 4 or 5 or 
more, form a circular tuft on the short erect rhizome. They vary in form from ovate- 
lanceolate to acute-lanceolate, and the width of my broadest specimen is less than 
half the length of the frond ; in the narrowest it is less than one-fourth. The texture 
i$ thin and the upper surfaces of the partial rhachises and costas bear long-glandular 
filaments. The colour of the frond in the fresh state is bright green, forming a 
beautiful contrast* with the dclicate pink tint “ (purplish sometimes) v of the rhachis 
and stipe. It is no doubt near A. Clarkei , and apparently grows in similar situations, 
but the fronds are broader and never root at the ends 
What Mr. Blanford styles long glandular filaments, and Colonel Beddome — 
weak setae, are called in the “ Synopsis Filieum firm yellow spines or strigillae. 
They seem to me to be quite soft, broadening at the base, and decurrent on the 
veins. Their function seems to me to be— to bother pteridologists. 
24. A. Mackinnoni Hope, in Journ. Bot, March 1896, p. 124 : 
<s Rh. quasi-erect, clothed, as is also the base of the stipe, with bright 
castaneous filiform scales. St. tufted, straw-colonred or pale 
brown, glabrous except near the base or with a few scattered 
scales for some inches upwards, 8-20 in. long. Fr. sub-deltoid or 
almost rhomboidal (lowest pair of pinnsne slightly shorter than next 
pair above), 13-23 in. 1. (average of sixteen measured— 18* in.) 
by 8-18 in. br. (average of twenty measured— 12J in.), bipinnate, 
