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NOTES ON THE FEKN-FLORA OF CHINA. 239
Mr. Baker's mention of this country was, I believe, in reference to ray
own specimen.
I may take this opportunity of remarking, in connection with my former
observations on the coalescence of tribes (Journ. Bot. Vol. III. p. 342),
that a very marked transition is effected between the genera Asplenium
and Aspidium, by such species as Asplenium yymnogrammoides, Kl.,
and A. puncticaide, var. bipinnatisecta, Mett. {= A. m,acrocarpmn, Bl.)
on the one hand, and Aspidium splendens, Wall., and A. ohtusissimum,
Mett. ! (=
A. sparsum, /S. latum, Thw. n. 1369 !) on the other; and,
again, through Asplenium Goerinc/ianum, Mett., A. Hohenackerianuni,
Kze,, and their allies, and Aspidium (smulum., Sw. I think it is diffi-
cult to look at these representatives of their respective genera without
believing them to be really allied, not merely somewhat alike. The
true position of Athyrinm, in so far at least as regards some of the
species, seems to me still veiy much open to question ; and Milde
insists strongly on its distinctness as a genus.
Dr. Wells Wdliams gathered at Ku-pei-kau, in the summer of 1865,
from fissures in the bricks' of the Great Wall, a curious dwarf variety
of Polypodium lingua, Sw., with oblong fronds f to 1 inch long only,
borne on stipites of nearly equal length.
With respect to Polypodium Cldnense, Mett., separated from F. nor-
iuale, Don, mainly on account of a more complicated venation, and the
absence of paraphyses, I may remark that P. normale is placed by
Mettenius himself, in his monograph of Polypodium (' Dispositio Spe-
cienim,' p. 24), in a section to which he ascribes " sori paraphysibus
destituti;" nor are any figured in Hooker and Greville's plate of P.
longifro7is, Wall. (Ic. Fil. i. t. 65). The only Indian (Khasia) specimen
of P. normale, to which I have at present access, has the sori too
much rubbed and defaced, from careless drying, to be trustworthy on
this point ; but, so far as concerns the venation, I can see no appre-
ciable difference between it and the Chinese Fern (Macao, Hance !
Fokien, De Grijs!), the number of free thickened veinlets in the
areolae being subject to a good deal of variation in the fronds of each.
The late Mr. Oldham sent me, from Formosa, a fine specimen of
Polypodium lomarioides, Kze., quite accordant with those from the
Philippines.