THE COMMON BRAKES 
Rhizome as thick as one’s little finger, subt black and ж 
externally, white succulent and starchy within. Fires branched, downy 
Stipes lateral and distant on the rhizome and adherent to it; ы 
dlo-shaped, black and velvety 
at the b 
i e, beneath the surface ; above yellowish green, pubescent when young, afterwards smooth, 
but sharply angular when mature, and about or rather over half the length of the frond ; a transverse 
t a fanciful resemblance to the 
section shows the ends of the vascular bundles arranged so as to presen 
imperial eagle, whence the specific name, Zachis channelled above, rounded behind, sometimes 
slightly asporulous. 
Vernation circinate ; the rachis is in an carly stage bent down abruptly elose against the stipes, 
Fronds variable in size, outline and composition, deep. 
em. In poor soils they vary from six to 
cighteen inches in height, and in more favourable localities they reach from three or four to eight or ten 
+; in the former cases the outline is nearly triangular, and from the lower pair of 
branches only being well developed, they appear threo-branched ; in the latter cases they are more 
elongated or oblong, and the growth consists of a series of brane 
In composition the smaller aro bipinnate, the larger fronds tripinnate. Pinna or branches ovate or 
oblong-ovate, opposite, often distant. Pinnutes or secondary pinnæ narrow lanceolate or narrowing 
from а broad base, opposite or alternate, contiguous, М т sometimes caudate. Pinnulets sessile 
entire or sinuate, oblong and adnate by their whole breadt 
or more ovate pinnatifid, and then 
with a narrower attachment, blunt at the apex, smooth above, hairy beneath ; the pinnatifid ones 
with blunt linear oblong or shorter triangular lobes, 
Venation of the mo m a stoutish 
entire pinnulots, consisting of forked veins arenately spreading fr 
m. In the 
midvein ; these veins are one, two, or three times forked, the venules extending to the marg 
pinnatifid pinnulets the veins become secondary midveins to the lobes, and give off a series of once or 
twice forked veins; in these latter the lowest branches right and left of the secondary midveins 
al areoles. Al 
frequently meet and unite forming a series of c 
he edges of the fertile pinnulets 
extends a longitudinal submarginal vein, which b 
mes the receptacle 
Fructifieation abundant on the back of the fronds, sub-marginal. Sori linear, continuous, the recep- 
tacular үсіп occupying nearly the margin of the pinnulets, and lying as it were in the axil of the 
indusium. Zndusium lin 
continuous, consisting of a thin whitish fringed membrane from th 
outer edge of the receptacle, and folded inwards over the spore-cases; beneath the spore-cases and 
growing from the inner edge of tho receptacle is another similar fringed membrane ; the fringes consist 
of small jointed hairs, Spore-cases roundish obovate. Spores round oblong or angular, muriculate 
Duration. "The rhizome is perennial, "The fr re annual, growing uj 
carly in May, but very 
impatient of cold or frosts, and killed by the early frosts of autumn, 
common and well-known Fern, but also easily recognised technically ritish Ferns, by the 
al sori, on compound fronds, not contracted, Like all other widely diffused 
