240 



F£/?uVS. 



nature, for they dwindle away and disappear after the second year Like 

 the van intennedium it seems to prefer the Pine-woods, and is also found 

 very frequently in Cedar swamps among rotting wood; it then assumes a 

 bright glossy green, and has the pinnules larger and more dilated. 



This very handsome, hardy fern dries well, especially the young 

 fronds, which retain their bright colour and are extremely attractive. The 

 sori on the fruit-bearing fronds, do not (or very rarely) extend to the 

 two lowest pairs of pinnae. Like other ferns of this tribe, the frond is 

 circinate in the bud, the root-stock very scaly, and the rootlets strong, 

 black, and fibrous. 



Marginal Shield Fern — Aspidium »ia?-giiiale, (Swz.) 



Of this fine hardy fern we have three distinct varieties besides the 

 more common normal form, known as the Marginal Shield Fern, and 

 described by Gray as of a light-green colour. This is not the colour of 

 oiir Canadian fern which is decidedly dark, or very full green. 



The fern described in the Manual agrees perfectly with fine specimens 

 found growing in a swampy, rocky, bush road, near the banks of the 

 river Otonabee, about a mile south-east of the village of Lakefield, but 

 differs from the more common dark-leaved evergreen fern of the Pine- 

 woods in the same neighbourhood, which is of a fine shining holly-green 

 colour, densely chaffy at the root-stock ; stipe, and rachis green, 

 and smooth, about two to three feet high in the larger fronds which are 

 pinnate ; pinnules crenate ; veins, waved ; sori, abundant, marginal, 

 leaden coloured, but turning brown when fully matured ; indusia, 

 depressed in the centre, kidney-form as in other Aspidiums. This is a 

 stately evergreen fe/n, common in rich damp woods, especially where 

 Pine and Hemlocks abound in rocky woodlands.s 



A very interesting small sized fern resembling the above, only of a 

 miniature growth, I have found in the rocky woods near the Otonabee ; 

 and also on a bit of wettish waste-land two miles north of Peterboro', 

 among rotten logs and limestone boulders. Stipe slender, smooth, very 

 chaffy at its root-stock, from four to ten inches in height. Many of the 

 fronds were fruitful at six inches in height, but usually the fruiting fronds 

 were the largest and strongest. The veinings were forked, and the mid- 

 veins blackish and waved; sori, distinct and formed at the upper fork of 

 the veinlets; colour of the indusia, at first whitish then of a leaden hue; 

 the scales at the junction of the stipes with the root-stock of a pale fawn- 

 colour, soft and thin pointed, and over-lapping as in the typical form. 

 The favourite soil ai)pears to be decaying wood, as it was chiefly found 

 growing on decayed logs, between the chinks or sheltered on the ground 

 below. The i)innules slightly crenate, oblong, blunt, and the whole plant 

 of a dark glossy-green. 



