CHAPTER IX 



MARATTIACE^ ISOETACE^ 



The MarattiacecE 



The Marattiaceae at the present time include four genera with 

 about twenty-five species, confined exclusively to tropical regions. 

 In a fossil condition they are much more numerous and 

 diversified, and according to Solms-Laubach ^ comprise the 

 majority of the carboniferous and pre-carboniferous Ferns. 



Recently a good deal of attention has been paid to these 

 Ferns, and our knowledge of their life-history and structure is 

 fairly complete. Some of them are Ferns of gigantic size. 

 Thus the stem of Angiopteris evecta is sometimes nearly a metre 

 in height and almost as thick, with leaves 5 to 6 metres in length, 

 and some species of Marattia are almost as large. The other 

 genera, Kaulfussia and Dancea, include only species of small or 

 medium size. While in the structure of the tissues and the 

 character of the sporangia these show resemblances to the 

 Ophioglossaceae, their general appearance is more like that of 

 the true Ferns, with which they, also agree in the circinate 

 vernation of their leaves. The sporangia are borne upon the 

 lower surface of ordinary leaves, as in most leptosporangiate 

 Ferns, but the sporangia themselves are very different, and are 

 more or less completely united into groups or synangia, which 

 •open either by longitudinal slits or, in Dancza, by a terminal 

 pore. The base of the leaf is provided with a pair of fleshy 

 stipules, which possibly correspond to the sheath at the base of 

 the petiole in Botrychiuin. 



^ Solms-Laubach (2), p. 142. 



