DESCRIPTIONS OF N.Z. FERNS. 93 



known as variety " esculenta " or " edulis," because its rhizomes are full of starch, like 

 arrowroot (I have known it used instead of arrowroot by a doftor), and formerly under 

 the names of "aruhe," " erau " or " roi," constituted an important item of Maori food. 

 These widely-creeping rhizomes are generally about as thick as a man's little finger, 

 and in ordinary soils contain a good deal of woody fibre mixed with the starch, but in 

 rich land, particularly near the margins of bush, there is often scarcely any fibre at all, 

 and the rhizome, when roasted in the embers and peeled, is not unlike captain's biscuit 

 in substance and flavour, but slightly bitter. The skin is dark brown. The fronds 

 spring up singly, a few inches asunder. The stipes is tall, erect, stiff, brown and shining, 

 and channelled on the upper side. When cut through, the seftion of the woody fibre 

 within it is seen to be arranged in a figure which the ancients fancied was like an 

 eagle (aquila) just raising its wings to fiy, and so gave the name " aquilina " to the fern. 

 Country labourers in the south-west of England profess to see, in the same figure, a 

 representation of King Charles in the oak tree. The rachis and costae are similar to 

 the stipes, but the latter shade gradually into the hue of the foliage. Frond broadly 

 triangular, bi or tri and occasionally quadri-pinnate in very large fronds, which are 

 sometimes, with the stipes, as much as fourteen feet high, near the margins of bush. 

 Pinnae stalked, broad and spreading, and divided into long linear ultimate lobes or 

 segments. When the fronds first expand, a sweet gum exudes from little knots or 

 buds in the axils. Sori narrowly linear, sub-marginal, and occupying nearly the whole 

 of the under-surface of the segments. Texture harshly coriaceous. Colour brownish 

 green. Very young plants are far prettier than older ones. They are more or less 

 tufted, the foliage is broad and almost membranaceous and the colour a bright oreen. 

 The stipes is shorter, and the frond bi-pinnate and oblong, with broad and lobed 

 pinnules. Plants sometimes retain the oblong frond for a considerable period; in fad 

 till long after the foliage has assumed its permanent narrow linear character. I have 

 seen fronds three feet long by only six or eight inches broad, and at first thought they 

 indicated a distinft variety of the fern, but I found that after a time the plants 

 produced fronds of the ordinary type. In some cases they were several years old before 

 they did so. This fern is found apparently all over the Southern Hemisphere, just as the 

 normal Pteris aquilina occurs throughout the northern one. It is found in the North 

 Island up to 3000 or 4000 feet ; but seems not to ascend so high farther south. 

 Though so common and hardy, it is not easy to cultivate. When its rhizomes are 

 enclosed in the sods used in building a fence, they produce fronds readily enough, but 

 if potted they are almost sure to die. Seedlings come up abundantly on faces of 

 side-cuttings, in pots, in ferneries and greenhouses, in caves and gravel-pits, and, in 

 fact, in all sorts of situations ; yet if moved into pots, or even shifted from a small pot 

 into a larger one, they almost always die. The plant evidently likes to have its own 

 way, and objefls to being petted. 



