GYMNOGRAHMA LEPTOPHYLLA. 
127 
GYMNOGRA'MMA LEPTOPHY'LLA. 
This is the Polypodium leptophyllum of Linnaeus, but 
he doubted whether it belonged to that genus, and in¬ 
clined to think it the link uniting Polypodium with 
Acrostichum and Osmunda. Decandolle considered it 
really a species of Acrostichum, and other botanists 
included it in Anogramma, Orammitis, Asplenium, and 
Osmunda. It was united with other species taken from 
Acrostichum and Hemionitis, to form the genus Oymno- 
gramma, by Desvaux, in 1808 . This name, derived 
from gymnos, naked, and gramma, writing, alludes to 
the naked fructification in some species being arranged 
somowhat like writing in straight lines. 
It is an annual, or at most a biennial. Its root is a 
tuft of short, slender, black fibres. Its fronds are 
usually about the height represented in our drawing: 
but in warm, favourable situations it will sometimes le 
twice as high. The barren fronds, as shown in our 
drawing, are only half as tall as the fertile fronds; they 
have from one to three fan-shaped leaflets, variously 
lobed, and at first resting upon the ground. The fertile 
fronds have a stout, pale brown, glossy stem, the leaflets 
occupy half its length, they are alternate, twice and 
sometimes thrice leafited, the leafits being also alternate, 
divided into three lobes, each lobe being two-toothed, so 
as to be somewhat reversed heart shaped. A vein 
passes into each lobe and forks so as to extend a branch 
into each tooth of the lobe. On these forks, and along 
