Polypodium. | FILICES. 83 
towards the base. Veins indistinct, copiously anastomosing; areoles 
rather large with included free veinlets. Sori large, globose, forming a 
single row on each side of the midrib, rather nearer the margin than the 
midrib.— Ann. Bot. v (1891) 479; Thoms. N.Z. Ferns (1882) 90; Field 
N.Z. Ferns (1890) 142, t. 27, £.3; Cheesem. Ill. N.Z. Fl. 11 (1914) t. 247. 
North Jstanp: Te Aroha, Pirongia, and Karioi Mountains, 7. F. C.; Lake 
Waikaremoana, A. Hamilton! Waimarino Forest, R. Curtis! T. F.C.; forest to the 
west of Ruapehu, H. OC. Field! T. F. C., Cockayne. Usually on logs or climbing up 
trees, rarely on the ground. 1500-3000 ft. 
Apparently confined to the forest country in the central portions of the North 
Island. Closely allied to P. diversifolium, but the rhizome is much stouter, and densely 
clothed with shaggy spreading scales; the fronds are larger, often 4 ft. long, and more 
deeply pinnatifid ; the segments are more numerous, longer and narrower; the venation 
is not so distinct, and the texture thinner. There is also no tendency to the poly- 
morphism of the fronds so noticeable in both P. diversifolium and P. pustulatum, and 
simple fronds are apparently unknown. — _ 
32. CYCLOPHORUS Desv. 
Rhizome long and creeping, or short and tufted. Stipes jointed on to 
the rhizome, not continuous with it. Fronds in the majority of the species 
simple and entire, often dimorphous, usually covered with a densely felted 
tomentum composed of star-like hairs carried at the top of a jointed stalk. 
Veins often buried in the substance of the frond, when visible copiously 
anastomosing. Sori numerous, dorsal, globose or oblong, irregularly 
placed, often covering the whole of the under-suriace of the upper part 
of the frond. Sporangia stalked, girt by an incomplete vertical ring, 
bursting transversely. 
A genus of about 50 species, mostly tropical, and best developed in Indo-Malaya, 
Melanesia, and Polynesia. There is little to separate it from Polypodiwm except the 
felted tomentum of star-shaped hairs. 
1. C. serpens C. Christen. Ind. Fil. (1905) 201.— Rhizome long, 
creeping, branched, climbing up the trunks of trees or over rocks, clothed 
with lanceolate long-acuminate ferruginous scales. Stipites remote, 3-3 in. 
long, firm, erect, jomted on the top of a scaly prolongation of the rhizome. 
Fronds dimorphous, simple, entire or obscurely sinuate, very thick and 
coriaceous, dark-green or yellow-green, glabrous or nearly so above, beneath 
densely clothed with whitish or buff-coloured stellate scales ; sterile fronds 
variable in size and shape, 1-8 or even 4 in. long, 3-1 in. broad, obovate- 
spathulate or elliptical-spathulate to nearly orbicular, obtuse; fertile 
longer and narrower, 2-6in. long, }-gin. broad, linear-oblong or lnear- 
lanceolate, obtuse or subacute, gradually tapering into the stipes. Veins 
quite hidden in the substance of the frond, copiously anastomosing. 
Sori very copious, irregularly scattered, large, prominent, often confined 
to the upper part of the frond, usually confluent in age—Polypodum serpens 
Forst. f. Prodr. (1786) n. 435 ; Hook. and Bak. Syn. Ful. (1873) 349 ; Benth. 
Fl. Austral. vii (1878) 767; Thoms. N.Z. Ferns (1882) 89; Feld N.Z. 
Ferns (1890) 140, t. 6, £. 9; Cheesem. Man. N.Z. Fl. (1906) 1012. 
P. rupestre R. Br. Prodr. (1810) 136 ; Hook. f. Handb. N.Z. Fl. (1864) 381 ; 
Hook. Sp. Fil. v (1864) 46. P. stellatum A. Rich. Fl. Nouv. Zel. (1832) 64. 
Niphobolus rupestris Spreng. Syst. Veg. iv (1827) 44; Hook. and Grev. Le. 
