120 Marginal Shield Fern 
bipinnate: apices pinnatifid, becoming dentate or crenate or sub- 
serrate or near tip undulate or entire, long-acuminate: pinne 
alternate or opposite, approximate or distant, short-stalked, the 
uppermost subsessile to sessile, lanceolate or ovate-lanceolate, or 
the basal unequally lanceolate-deltoid; mostly broadest above 
the base or below the middle: pinnules mostly approximate, the 
innermost largely subsessile to short-stalked, otherwise mostly 
adnate to rachis and somewhat decurrent, oblong or oblong- 
lanceolate, often oblique, sometimes slightly falcate, obtuse or 
subacute or rarely acute, entire to dentate or crenately toothed or 
lobed, or pinnatifid on the inner side or both sides: margins mi- 
nutely paleaceous at or near nodes of pinne’s lobes to glabrous: 
surfaces somewhat chaffy along or near rachises: scales minute or 
larger, lance-linear or linear, acuminate, ciliate-toothed: rachises 
furrowed on face: color dark-bluish-green or sometimes yellow- 
ish: texture subcoriaceous. 
Venation pinnate, free: veinlets mostly curved: lobes of 
pinnules each occupied by a primary branch of the pinnule’s 
midvein: primary branches of pinnules’ midveins mostly once- 
forked or bearing branches which are simple or once-forked or 
in the larger lobes bear simple branches, or in smaller pinnules 
and apices of pinnules simple. 
Sori submarginal, borne on the simple superior basal branches 
of primary branches of pinnules’ midveins or on superior basal 
branches of the compound, below or more rarely on apices of 
veinlets: indusia at first white, becoming lead-colored, finally 
brown, orbicular-reniform, convex at first, entire, glabrous. 
S pores ovoid-reniform, with a narrow crenulate wing. 
Habitat. Woods, roadsides, and stone walls: particularly on 
or near rocks, or on old logs or stumps in wet woods and swamps. 
