The Plant World 



A MONTHLY JOURNAL OF POPULAR BOTANY. 



Vol. hi. SEPTEMBER, 1900. No. 9. 



THE HART'S-TONGUE IN NEW YORK AND TENNESSEE.* 



By William R. Maxon. 



SO unique a fern is the Hart's-tongue {^PhylUtis scolopendrhim 

 (L.) Newm.) among the species of the United Statest hat the 

 average amateur may easily pass it without recognizing it as a 

 fern at alL At a short distance it reminds one somewhat of narrow- 

 dock, minus a stem, or even of the common broad-leaved wood-sedge, 

 Carex plant aginea, which in fact sometimes occurs near it; but a 

 second glance only is needed to prove the emptiness of such com- 

 parison. The leaves are a thousand tinies more beautiful; the plant 

 itself a picture of perfect grace. The accompanying drawing shows 

 well the outlines of the fronds and their way of clustered growth; 

 but there is an indescribable charm in the fern itself which even a 

 camera must fail to catch. Indeed, to one who knows the Hart's- 

 tongue only in the herbarium a most pleasant surprise is in store if 

 the fern be sought in its home. 



An average plant at Chittenango Falls or at Jamesville, New York, 

 will consist of some ten to twenty fronds, arranged in a circular crown, 

 more or less irregularly for the fern spreads somewhat by giving rise to 

 plants from the rootstock, the whole forming a dense cluster. The 

 fronds neither stand erect nor rest upon the ground, but assume a half- 

 reclining position with a lazy gracefulness that suggests an indolent 

 rather than a slovenly bearing. No other of our northern ferns with 

 which I am familiar, unless it be possibly Goldie's fern, carries with it 

 a suggestion of such elegance. A single frond seems coarse enough, 

 a plain leaf a foot or more long and an inch and-a-half wide, heart- 



*Publi.shed by permission of the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution. 



