FILICES. 31 



apex, very minutely serrulate or crenate, or almost entire ; veins 

 running from the midrib of the pinnules to their margins, twice or 

 thrice forked. Fertile fronds similar to the barren ones, but with 



3 to 9 of the upper pairs of pinnae and the apex of the frond bearing 

 contracted spur-shaped pinnules, thickly clothed with roundish and 

 often coalescent glomerules of sporangia. 



In bogs, meadows, wet heaths, and damp woods, and on wet ledges 

 of rock. Sparingly distributed over England and Scotland, but much 

 more abundant towards the west side of the island, extending from 

 Cornwall, Devon, Dorset, Hants, Sussex, and Kent, to Sutherland 

 and Caithness. It does not appear to be recorded from Orkney ; but 

 I think the late Mr. Robert Heddle told me he had found it there. 

 Generally distributed throughout Ireland, but there also more 

 plentiful in the west. 



England, Scotland, Ireland. Perennial. Summer, Autumn. 



Plant with few heads, the caudex attaining a large size before it 

 divides; divisions of the caudex nearly vertical, thickly clothed with 

 the decayed bases of former fronds, in old luxuriant plants sometimes 

 attaining a height of 2 feet above the ground, but in exposed situations 

 only rising a few inches. Fronds 5 to 12, erect or when very 

 luxuriant arching backwards, usually 2 to 4 feet high, but in favour- 

 able localities often much taller. I have seen it 5 or 6 feet high in 

 the Isle of Bute; Mr. Newman has measured fronds 8 feet high on 

 the banks of Loch Fyne ; Mr. W. Bennett records it about the 

 same height in Merivale Wood, at the foot of Leith Hill, Surrey ; and 

 Mr. T. Moore says it is occasionally 10 to 12 feet high in very 

 damp, sheltered spots. The rachis is attached by a narrow base to 

 the caudex, and gives off a strong root-fibre from its back above 

 the point of attachment, above which it is greatly enlarged and fur- 

 nished on each side with a stipule-like expansion, something like 

 th.e blade of a feather, or still more like the pen found in the cuttle- 

 fish called the squid (Loligo) : in large plants this wing is from 2 to 



4 inches long, projecting \ to ^ an inch, it ends rather abruptly 

 upwards ; it is plicate and crisped at the margin, and splits readily 

 from above obliquely downwards. The rachis itself is green, convex 

 on the back, flattened on the anterior surface, which is bounded by 

 two slightly raised rounded strips ; when cut through the vascular 

 bundle is visible as a curved line with its two free ends rolled in- 

 wards. The fronds are at first tinged with reddish but become pea- 

 green when mature, they have 5 to 9 pairs of rather distant and 

 nearly opposite pinnae ; the pinnules or ultimate segments are sub- 

 sessile, 5 to 14 pairs in each pinna, each one f to 2f inches long 

 by i to f * llcn b roa( l ; they are placed nearly opposite to each 



