THE FERNS OF NORTH-WESTERN INDIA 
167 
From the last clause of the above, and also from what Bianford says in his 
il List 93 as to the fronds varying from lanceolate to deltoid lanceolate,, I think 
it evident that these three authorities included, under A. schimperi , A, rupicola 
Hope, though it has a very different root-stock. The rhizome, or sarmenium , of 
A. schimperi is widely creeping and branching, and, where its growth is not 
impeded by circumstances, the fronds spring up quite apart ; but A. rupicola 
grows in isolated plants : the caudex is thick and erect, or sometimes procum- 
bent, and the stipes are always densely tufted. 
The rhizome of A, schimpm is densely clothed with bright-brown narrowly 
lanceolate- acuminate scales ; those at the base of stipe few, and darker in 
colour. Bianford rightly says that the basal portion of the stipe is dark- 
coloured, though I should say purplish brown, rather than deep purple. 
Beddome rightly corrects Baker in saying that the frond is only bipinnate— 
tripinnatifid, or sometimes only bipinnatifid. I have both these forms grown 
on the same rhizome, and the cutting of their pinnules is very different. 
Beddome is incorrect, 'I think, in saying that the frond is *■ * lanceolate, 
gradually reduced below ** : the shape may be called broadly lanceolate-acu- 
minate, somewhat truncate at base : Bianford notices this. The rhachises of the 
pinnae are winged, with an actual interruption of the wing only in well devel- 
oped fronds ; and the pinnules are decurrent both ways on the rhachis, so 
that the fern is only just bipinnate. Even in the largest Indian fronds the 
wing is sometimes unbroken, and it is continuous in the reduced basal pinnae 
even when broken in those above. The basal pinnae are apt to be sterile, or 
partly so, at their bases. 
The specimens of the African and Indian plants in Kew do not exactly agree ; 
and I have noted that the only specimen in the Calcutta Herbarium so named 
(before I .picked out Indian ones in 1896), from T. Moore’s Herbarium, ticketed 
Africa, is different from the Indian plant in cutting and that the pinna 1 are 
opposite. That specimen has no rhizome. But the Indian plant may stand 
as A. schimperi until the African plant is better known. 
29 0 A. pectinatnm, Wall. Cat. 23 1 5 as to type sheet only. A. filk - 
femina , Bomb, (an E. Indian form of), Syn. Fil. 228. A. filk-femina , var. 2, 
pecfcinafa (sp.), Wall., 0. E. 492. Athyrium filix-femina , var. 2, pectinata , 
Wall, Bodd. H. B. 169. Athyrium pectinatum, Wall., Bedd. Suppt. H. B. 36. 
Punjab i Chamba — Ravi Valley, Sao Valley and elsewhere not specified, Mc- 
Donell ; Kangra V. 2?.— 4500', Trotter ; Simla Reg.— -4500-6000', common, in and 
about Simla, 
N.-W. P. : D. D , Dist .— In the Du— 2500', Mussooree 4-6000' : plentiful in several 
places ; T. Garh . 4-5000', Duthie, Gamble ; Kumaun 4-7000', frequent. 
DlSTBIB .— Asia % N. Ind. (Him.) Bhutan 2-7000'; Bengal— Parasnath Mt. 4-4500 1 
T. T„, C. B. Clarke , F. IL Ward in Herb, Rev* A. Campbell , 
8 
