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1896] BRIEFER ARTICLES 409 
characteristic long, more or less pointed form common to that species. 
Its time of maturing its spores also clearly distinguishes it from B. 
ternatum. Moreover, B. ternatum is characterized by its hairy bud, a 
character which is constant in Alabama specimens, while the bud of 
B. biternatum is smooth. 
There are some other distinct species that have been lumped with 
B. ternatum which must be separated, if indeed our northern species is 
the teal B. ternatum Thunb. originally described from Japan; one of 
these species at least is American, but I wait for additional material 
to confirm this view. It is almost incomprehensible how such entirely 
distinct species can be thrown together in composites as has been 
repeatedly done by the English authorities on ferns. This is the com- 
mon condition met with by any one who undertakes the study of these 
plants in their native haunts the world over. Jenman has found this 
true in Jamaica; Mr. Davenport and myself in Mexico; and I have 
found the same thing in a recent study of Hawaiian ferns. _ 
Another interesting find in the vicinity of Auburn is the rare Ophio- 
glossum crotalophoroides, which occurs in low grassy bottoms, and is 
occasionally found on gentle grassy slopes. It grows with its bulb 
deeply buried in the earth, the base of the sterile leaf barely rising 
above the surface. This station is the farthest inland the plant has 
yet been found. 
The common ferns of central Alabama, aside from the ubiquitous 
Pleris aquilina, and Polypodium polypodioides on tree trunks and rocks, are 
Woodwardia arcolata, Asplenium filix-famina, A. platyneuron, and Dry- 
pteris acrostichoides, the latter almost at its southern limit. Cheilanthes 
fancsa is abundant on metamorphic rocks, Woodsta obtusa is occasional 
Onoclea senstbilis 
he open marshes. 
ee county. Here we 
ave an elevation of something like eight hundred feet, and this ridge 
in. As we 
