210 HISTORY OF BRITISH FERNS. 



fleshy body, producing a few coarse spreading roots chiefly 

 from its upper extremity. At the top it tapers abruptly 

 into a short conical crown. From this crown rises the 

 frond, which attains from about one and a half to three 

 inches in height, and is divided above at about one-third 

 of its height, into a barren leafy branch, and a spicate 

 fertile branch. Occasionally a barren radical frond, of 

 lanceolate form, accompanies the two-branched frond. The 

 stipes is slender, smooth, round, sheathed at the base by 

 broad taper-pointed scales, which are dilated below, and 

 envelop the crown. The barren branch is spreading, lan- 

 ceolate, narrowing towards but bluntish at the apex, and 

 tapering at the base into a slender petiole ; it is from 

 three-fourths of an inch to an inch and a half long, some- 

 what hollow along the centre, from the elevation of its 

 margins, thick and fleshy in texture when fresh, so that 

 the very slender veins are not seen ; they are, however, 

 united in very much elongated meshes. The fertile branch 

 or spike is somewhat taller than the barren branch, and is 

 supported by a footstalk, which is thickened upwards, 

 becoming broad, fleshy, and flattened at the base of the 

 spike. The spike itself is about half an inch long, linear, 

 rather widened a little above the base, with a tapering 



