50 



THE BOOK OF CHOICE FERNS. 



to grow in crevices of shaded, calcareous rocks, from Canada to the Rocky 

 Mountains of British America, and southward to Alabama, Arkansas, the 

 Indian Territory, and Arizona ; it has also been found in several parts of 

 Mexico, and even in South America, in the Andes of Mecoya, where it is 

 said to grow at 8000ft. to 10,000ft. elevation. Having been first collected 

 about 1736, on the shore of the River Rappahannock, in a shady place by 

 the root of a Juniper, near the promontory called Point Lookout, Eaton takes 

 pleasure in giving it an English name, and calls it " Clayton's Cliff Brake." 



According to the age of this plant, its fronds, 

 which are produced from a short, knotted rootstock, 

 and borne on upright, rigid, though slender stalks 

 Sin. to 4in. long and more or less woolly, are of 

 different forms and dimensions (see Plate). They 

 vary from 4in. to 12in. in length, from 2in. to 6in. 

 in breadth, and from spear-shaped and simply 

 pinnate (only once divided to the midrib) to 

 broadly spear-shaped and furnished with deltoid 

 pinnse (leaflets in shape of the Greek delta, A), 

 bearing on each side several nearly stalkless leafits 

 lin. to 2in. long, seldom more than Jin. broad, 

 entire or sharply auricled (eared) at one or both 

 sides at the base (Fig. 17). The fronds are of 

 a leathery texture and of a bluish colour, which 

 forms a very pleasing contrast with the chestnut- 

 brown tint of the stalks and midribs. The 

 involucre, which is formed of the slightly-altered, incurved edge of the 

 leafits, is eventually almost hidden by the broad line of fructification. — 

 Hooker, Species Filicum, ii., p. 139. Nicholson, Dictionary of Gardening, 

 iii., p. 66. Eaton, Ferns of North America, ii., t. 54. Lowe, Ferns British 

 and Exotic, iii., t. 30a. 



Fi^. 17. Fertile Pinna of Pellsea 

 atropurpurea 



(nat. size). 



P. (Cheiloplecton) auriculata— Cheil-op-lec'-ton ; aur-ic-ul-a^ta (eared). 

 Link. 



A greenhouse species, of medium dimensions, native of Qape Colony, 

 bearing on flaccid and slightly scaly stalks, 2in. to 3in. long and of a bright 



