FILICES. 63 



Var. y is a firmer and more upright plant than either of the pre- 

 ceding ; it is about a week or ten days later in unfolding its fronds in 

 spring than the plants of the other form growing side by side with it, 

 and it bears a greater degree of frost ; for although in Fife it is 

 always killed by the winter's frosts on exposed hillsides, in woods 

 the fronds survive the winter, and, unless broken down by snow, 

 remain upright as well as green until early spring ; while var. a 

 growing with it hardly ever survives as long as the new year, 

 and even if the fronds remain green till then, the stipes, which is 

 weaker, gives way, and they lie flat on the ground. The much 

 greater number of scales on the stipes and rachis, and their per- 

 sistence, is also a marked feature ; but perhaps the most striking is 

 the shape of the indusium. In all forms of Fiiix-mas the indusium is 

 firmer, more convex, and more persistent, than in any other British 

 Fern ; but in var. paleacea these characters are most pronounced. In 

 vars. genidna and qffinis the free or anterior margin of the indusium 

 is not incurved ; it looks like a watch-glass over the sporangia, with 

 the notch where it is attached to the vein not reaching the middle of 

 the indusium, and represented by a shallow pit connected by a furrow 

 with the reniform posterior margin. In var. paleacea the free margins 

 are incurved, and the notch extends further into the indusium, so that 

 it is not merely reniform in outline, but actually resembles a miniature 

 sheep's kidney with the ends brought together. In size it varies much, 

 according to its place of growth. I have Monmouthshire specimens 

 in good fruit less than a foot long by 4 inches broad, and in woods at 

 Balmuto it grows 5 feet long by I foot broad, with a stipes the thick- 

 ness of a man's little finger, and containing 11 vascular bundles when 

 cut halfway between the caudex and the beginning of the lamina. I 

 much regret that the name Borreri, by which the plant is generally 

 known in this country, cannot be retained, in accordance with the 

 rigid rules of Fern-nomenclature, as Don described it under the name 

 of Aspidium paleaceum, fifty-one years before Newman published it 

 as Dryopteris Borreri. 



Var. 8. pumila much resembles a dwarf form of genuina, but the 

 scales are more numerous and darker. The chief distinction lies 

 in the minute glands, with which not only the under-surface of the 

 frond but even the indusium is dotted. I have no authentic wild 

 specimens. The cultivated plant I obtained from Messrs. Sang, 

 nurserymen, Kirkcaldy, and believe it to be correctly named. It 

 has fronds 6 or 7 inches long by 2 broad, and is remarkable for the 

 extreme shortness of the stipes, which is only |tol inch long. The 

 points of the pinnae are bent upwards and slightly twisted, so as to 

 give a crisped appearance to the frond. Mr. Black's Teesdale speci- 

 mens, which I refer to pumila, are 8 or 9 inches long by 3 inches 

 broad, with petioles about 1| inch long. Both of these have but from 

 1 to 3 sori on each pinna or ultimate segment, so that they are in 

 a row on each side of the midrib, which appears to be one of the 



