OUR NATIVE FERNS AND THEIR ALLIES. 



ORDER VII. SELAGINELLACE.E. 



Plant-body leafy, terrestrial, moss-like, with branching stems 

 and minute scale-like leaves. Sporangia one-celled, solitary, 

 axillary, some containing microspores, and others macrospores. 

 Contains a single genus largely tropical. 



I. SELAGINELLA Beauv. 



Fructification arranged in spikes. Sporangia minute, sub- 

 globose, opening transversely; some containing usually 4 glo- 

 bose macrospores, and others smaller, rilled with numerous 

 microspores. Leaves 4 many ranked. Name a diminutive of 

 Selago, an ancient name of some species of Lycopodium, which 

 this genus resembles. Contains about 335 species widely dis- 

 tributed ; seven are found within our limits. 



i. EUSELAGINELLA. Stem leaves of one kind, many- 

 ranked ; bracts uniform. 



* Stems prostrate or spreading, somewhat rigid. 

 i. S. rupestris (L.) Spring. Stems densely tufted, pros- 

 trate or ascending, much-branched, 2' 12' long; leaves ap- 

 pressed imbricate, linear or linear-lanceolate, convex and sulcate 

 dorsally, rigid, bristle-tipped, ciliate; spikes strongly quadran- 

 gular, 6" 12" long; sporangia of both sorts in the same axils; 

 macrosporangia abundant ; bracts ovate-lanceolate. (Lycopo- 

 dium rupestre L., L. bryopteris Wall.) New England to Flor- 

 ida, Texas, California, and northward. 



Var. tortipila (A. Br.) Unde. Leaves sub-entire, gibbous 

 near the apex ; terminal bracts tipped with a long, twisted, white 

 awn ; macrospores loosely reticulate. Caesar's Head, South 

 Carol ina(/.Z?.5;/M); Negro Mountain, North Carol ina(rvy). 

 2. S. selaginoides(L.)Link. Sterile stems prostrate-creep- 

 ing, small and slender; fertile stems thicker, ascending, simple, 

 !' 3' h gh; leaves lanceolate, acute, spreading, sparsely spinu- 

 lose-ciliate ; bracts lax, ascending, lanceolate or ovate-lanceo- 

 late, strongly ciliate. (S. spinosa Beauv., Lycopodium selagi- 

 noides L., L. ciliatum Lam.) New Hampshire to Colorado and 

 northward to Greenland. 



** Stems pendent, flaccid. 

 3- S. Oregana D. C. Eaton. Stems i 6 long, pinnately 



