TRDIIP III FERTILE FRONDS UNIFORMLY SOMEWHAT LEAF-LIKE, 

 UKUUr YET DIFFERING NOTICEABLY FROM STERILE FRONDS 



i6. PURPLE CLIFF BRAKE 



Pellaa atropurpurea 



Canada to Georgia and westward, usually on limestone clfffs ; with 

 wiry purplish stalks. 



Fertile fronds. — Six to twenty inches high, leathery, bluish-green, 

 pale underneath, once, or below twice, pinnate ; pinna, upper ones 

 long and narrow, lower ones usually with one to four pairs of 

 broadly linear pinnules ; sporangia bordering the pinnae, bright 

 brown at maturity ; indusium formed by the reflexed margin of the 

 frond. 



Sterile fronds. — Usually much smaller than the fertile and less 

 abundant ; pinna oblong, entire, or slightly toothed. 



The Purple Cliff Brake is one of the plants that re- 

 joice in un-get-at-able and perilous situations. Al- 

 though its range is wider than that of many ferns, 

 this choice of inconvenient localities, joined to the 

 fact that it is not a common plant, renders it likely 

 *hat unless you pay it the compliment of a special 

 expedition in its honor you will never add it to the 

 list of your fern acquaintances. 



But when all is said we are inestimably in debt to 



the plants so rare or so exclusive as to entice us out 



of our usual haunts into theirs. Not only do they 



draw us away from our books, out of our houses, 



but off the well-known road and the trodden path 



into unfamiliar woods which stand ready to reveal 



fresh treasures, across distant pastures where the 



fragrant wind blows away the memory of small 



anxieties, up into the hills from whose sumtnits we 



get new views. 



Although the Purple Cliff Brake grows, I believe 



90 



