ATHYRIUM FILIX-FEMINA. 211 



The radicles are black, fibrous, and wiry : the caudex is very 

 large, and its position erect ; it sometimes rises several inches 

 above the surface of the ground ; in one instance I have seen it 

 more than a foot in height, thus evincing a considerable proxi- 

 mity to the tree ferns of tropical countries : Dr. Ball, of Dub- 

 lin, showed me a plant of Filix-femina in a Wardian case, in 

 which this peculiarity was very remarkable. 



The fronds make their appearance in May ; at first their ver- 

 nation is circinate, but as they advance the apex becomes free, 

 and hangs down, assuming the appearance of a shepherd's crook 

 (fig. b, page 207) : the form of the frond is lanceolate, and regu- 

 larly pinnate: the pinnules are simply toothed, or pinnatifid, or 

 pinnate : the stipes varies from a quarter to a third of the entire 

 length of the frond, and is swollen at the base ; it has numerous 

 elongate blackish scales, which are particularly abundant at the 

 base, and more scattered, smaller, and scarcely observable on 

 the rachis : both stipes and rachis are frequently tinged with 

 purple and red ; in some instances I have seen them assuming 

 almost the colour of coral. 



The midvein of the pinnules is waved ; the lateral veins are 

 forked shortly after leaving the midvein, and each branch runs 

 into one of the teeth, but ceases before actually touching the 

 margin : the anterior branch of each bears on its side, about 

 midway between the midvein and margin, a linear cluster of 

 capsules : the a,nterior free edge of the involucre is split into a 

 series of capillary segments. The frond is extremely tender 

 and fragile, and withers almost immediately on being gathered. 



§mtim. 



In treating of varieties, I shall adopt the same plan with the 

 lady fern as I have done with the gentleman. Not being fully 

 convinced that the named plants are really species, I cannot 

 conscientiously so denominate them : the difficulty, as in Filix- 

 mas, being not in the want of distinctness between extreme 

 forms, but in the multiplicity of intervening individuals. 



