FERNS OF THE MALAY-ASIATIC REGION. 
27 
Ceratopteris thal ictroides (L. ) Brongn. (Plate XV.) 
Stipes 5 to 30 cm high, flesh} 1 ; frond deltoid-ovate; rachises flattened 
and winged; pinnules few and their segments very few; sterile segments 
oblong or lanceolate, usually obtuse, entire; fleshy or membranaceous; 
fertile segments narrowly linear, acute, often deficient in chlorophyll, the 
margin folded over the sporangia. This fern is common in wet meadows 
and along ditches. The fronds normally stand above the water, but the 
sterile are not rarely immersed. 
Pantropic, and north to Japan. 
9. MATON IACE2E. 
Rhizome creeping hairy; fronds dichotomous but with unequal develop- 
ment of the branches; sori dorsal, of few (up to 1-1) sporangia borne on 
or at the base of a raised receptacle, which also bears the umbrella-shaped 
peltate inclusium; sporangia opening almost transversely; annulus only 
oblique enough to be complete. Two genera and only three known 
species. Perhaps the remnant of a primitive group ancestral to Poly- 
podiaceae and Cyatheaceae. 
Frond erect, pedate or' fan-shaped 1. Matonia 
Frond pendent, sympodial, elongate 2. Phanerosorus 
1. MATONIA B. Brown. 
Fronds erect stout, rachis forked at the apex, each branch giving olf 
pinnatificl pinnae on the upper (inner) side; veins free except that the 
sori are borne where a number of veinlets converge; indusium curved 
back under the sporangia almost to the receptacle. 
Segments oblique, acute 1. M. pectinata 
Segments at a right angle, obtuse - 2. .1/. Foxworthyi 
1. Matonia pectinata R. Br. 
Stipe rigid, about 2 m high when well developed; longer pinnae 20 
(to 60?) cm long, linear, hard-coriaceous, brownish above, more or less 
glaucous beneath, glabrous; segments borne at an acute angle, falcate, 
narrowed from the base, acute; sori borne at the bases of the segments; 
sporangia about 7. 
Malacca, Mount Ophir; Amboyna? 
2. Matonia foxworthyi Copel. Philip. -Journ. Sci. Bot. 3 (1908) 343. (Plate 
XVI.) 
Like the preceding species, but the segments horizontal, straight, ob- 
tuse, truncate, or refuse, linear, up to 35 mm long, often bearing more 
than one sorus on a side. 
Borneo, Sarawak, Mount Poe, alt. 1,700 ni. 
