FERNS OF GREAT BRITAIN. 101 



greater number of fronds are thrice pinnate, having 

 several pair of pinnae, with twice pinnate branches. In 

 some cases all the pinnules are entire; in others they 

 are pinnatifid. The stalk is usually rather more than 

 half the length of the frond ; it is green, and while 

 young, somewhat downy, bat as the fern grows older 

 it becomes very hard and rigid, and has so many angles 

 upon it, that many a wanderer in the woods has suf- 

 fered from grasping it too hastily. In places where the 

 fronds do not attain any luxuriance, they are more 

 decidedly triangular; they have then the appearance 

 of being three-branched, because the other pairs of 

 pinnae, so usual on the finer specimens, are not in this 

 case developed. 



The fronds of the Brake are almost all fertile ; yet, 

 let us gather the plant at what season we may, no 

 fructification is to be seen on its under surface until 

 we search for it; not that the capsules are not abun- 

 dant, for, during Autumn, they cluster in profusion on 

 almost every plant, but they are hidden under the margin. 

 In this plant the margin of the fern forms the indusium. 

 It is thickened into a rim, beneath which lies a row of 

 capsules, which run all round the edge of the fern. If 

 our fathers had known this fern only, we should not 

 have wondered at the idea which some, at least, seem 

 to have had, that ferns bore no seed. Pliny says, " Of 

 fern be two kinds, and they bear neither flower nor 

 seed." The general opinion some centuries later, how- 

 ever, was, that the fern-seed was visible only on St. 

 John's Eve, just at the precise moment at which the 

 Saint was born : — 



