rs Fe 
HEMIONITIS paar, 
! Pailmated H emionitis. 
\ 
CRYPTOGAMIA Jaca € —Nar. Ono. FILICES, Fuss, Div. I. Gynata, Br. 
Gen. Car. —Capsulee venis reticulatis frondis insertee. &A nvolucrum nullum. 
—Willd. 
Hemionitis palmata; hirsuta, fronde pentagona profunde quinquefida, 
segmentis lanceolatis crenato-lobatis, stipite elongato. 
Hemionitis palmata, Linn. Sp. Pl. p. 1535. —Swartz, Syn. Fil. p.20.—Lam. 
Illust. t. 868. £. 2.—Wiup. Sp. Pl. v. 5. p. 129.—Arr. Hort. Ken. ed. 2. 
v. 5. p. 902. 
Root of many long, oo es scarcely hairy, fibres, (Sw.) Stipes many 
- from the same root, 4-6 inches long, erect, about as thick as a crow’s 
quill, purplish-brown, covered with ferruginous patent hairs. Frond 3-4 
inches in length, somewhat cordate in its circumscription, deeply divided 
into 5 segments which spread out so as to form a pentagon ; of these the 3 
superior lobes are the longest, all are rather broadly lanceolate, hairy, dark 
green above, paler beneath, the centre furnished with a strong purplish 
rib, prominent on the underside, the margins crenato-lobate, the lobes 
obtuse, fringed. | 
Fructification confined to the numerous branching anastomosing lateral veins, 
forming raised lines, and destitute of involucrum. Capsules numerous, at — 
length confluent, and covering almost the whole back of the frond, sphe- 
rical, pedicellated, reticulated, with an incomplete annulus. Seeds or 
sporules minute. 
- The H emionitis palmata was Pople to our gardens 
from the West Indies in the year 1793, by Rear-Admiral 
Buicu, and it deserves a place in every collection of stove- 
plants, being no less remarkable in the shape of its frond, than 
in the lines of fructification, which cover the underside of it 
like a network of arich brown colour. It is readily kept in a 
pot of common earth, with a mixture of peat, and with the roots 
placed between two broken pieces of flower-pot, with the con- 
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