Br : . . . . - r
j r l f
i i
are found just within the margin; they are dark-brown in
color, and contain spheroid-tetrahedral spores.
The true name of this fern has been the subject of
much difference of opinion among Pteridologists. Mr. Smith
considers it identical with the Pteris sulphurea of Cavanilles,
but does not claim to have seen the original specimens of
that author. The earliest name for it in the genus Notho-
loena is N. pulveracea, of Kunze. But Kunze gave no specific
character to his plant, and, moreover, chose a specific name
which had been used already for another not very distantly
related fern. I have preferred, therefore, to retain Hooker’s
name, as being the first name under the proper genus which
was accompanied by an adequate specific character.
Plate X L IX ., Fig . 1 - 3 .— Noiholoena Candida. The specimen selected
for illustration was collected in the Mexican Boundary Survey.
Fig. 2 is a segment of one of the middle pinnæ, with the ceraceous
powder removed, so as to show the veins. Fig. 3 is a spore.
P l a t e X L IX .— F ig . 4 - 7 .
NO THO LÆ NA H OO K ER I. D. C. E a t o n .
Hooker’s Notholæna.
N o t h o l æ n a H o o k e r i ; — Root-stock short, creeping,
densely covered with rigid blackish-brown lanceolate scales;
stalks clustered, four to eight inches high, wiry, reddish-brown,
smooth and shining, bearing a few ovate scales near the base;
frond two to two and a half inches long and broad, almost
regularly pentagonal, composed of three divisions; the middle
one raised on a short narrowly winged stalk, rhomboid-ovate,
pinnatifid into a few oblong toothed segments, of which the
first pair is smaller than the second; the side-divisions sessile,
deltoid, pinnatifid on the upper side much as in the
middle division, but each bearing on the lower side a single
much elongated basal segment, and above it smaller segments
like those of the upper side; upper surface dull-green,
smooth, lower surface covered with a yellow or yellowish-
white ceraceous powder; sporangia sub-marginal; the edge
of the frond slightly recurved
Notholæna H o o k ri, E aton, Ferns of the South-West, p. 3 0 8 , t. xxx.
Notkolætia cretacea, E a to n , in Bot. Mex. Boundary, p. 234 ; Bulletin of
Torrey Botan. Club, iv., p. 18 , not of Liebmann.
Notholæna Candida, var. s-fido-palmata, H o o k e r , Sp. Fil., v., p. t i i .