CHEILANTHES CALIFORNICA. 

 SHIELD-LIKE LIP-FERN. 



NATURAL ORDER, FILICES. 



CHEILANTHES CalifoRNICA, Metteiiius.— Rootstock short, creeping, chaffy with narrow dark 

 brown scales; stalks densely tufted, dark-brown, glossy, four to eight inches long; frond 

 four inches long or less, broadly deltoid-ovate, smooth on both surfaces, delicately quadri- 

 pinnatifid (that is to say, four-pinnate, with all but the primary rachis narrowly winged); 

 lower pinnae largest, triangular, more developed on the lower side ; upper ones gradually 

 smaller and simjjler; ultimate pinnules lanceolate, very acute, incised or serrate, and 

 when fruiting with usually separate, crescent-shaped, membraneous involucres in the si- 

 nuses between the teeth, which also are often at length recurved. (Eaton in Rothrock's 

 Botany of Wheeler'' s Expedition. See also Eaton's Ferns of Xorth America.') 



N the work from which we have taken our description, Pro- 

 fessor Eaton says of this species : " Moist shady canons 

 and ravines in the coast ranges of California, received by me 

 only from Santa Barbara and Los Angeles counties, but prob- 

 ably of wider range. Sonora, Mexico, Schott. A very delicate 

 and pretty fern, and eagerly sought by collectors. Sir William 

 Hooker placed it in the genus Hypolcpis, a genus of large ferns, 

 which are utterly unlike this plant in habit, and are really much 

 nearer to Phcgopteris than to Chcilantlics. The involucres are 

 lunulate, and of a different substance from the lobule, at the base 

 of which they are placed, but as the sporangia ripen this lobule 

 is frequently reflexed, so as to form a sort of second involucre." 

 Though this species is named Chcilanihcs Califoniica, it is not 

 the only one that is native to that State, as there are several 

 species existing there, — nor is it so abundant as to deserve this 

 particular name, for, though the remark of Professor P2aton that 

 it "is probably of wider range" than his collections indicate, is cor- 

 rect, it is undoubtedly more limited than some others. It was 



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