CHAPTER XIV 



MASSACHUSETTS FERN 



Dryopteris simulata. 



Rootstock wide-creeping, forking, cordlike, brown, sparingly 

 furnished with small, pale-brown, ovate-deltoid, reticulate scales: 

 leaves clustered or approximate, springing from all sides of root- 

 stock: roots few and coarse, clothed with mustard-colored wool, 

 springing from rootstock. 



Leaves erect or ascending, withering in autumn, twelve to 

 forty-eight inches long or longer, sterile leaves the shorter, some- 

 times only half as long as sporophylls. 



Petioles six to twenty inches long, slender, stramineous, fur- 

 rowed on face, bearing a few pale-brown, ovate-acuminate scales; 

 at base dark brown, slightly compressed: fibrovascular bundles 

 two, flattish. 



Blades six and four-fifths to twenty-two inches long, two to 

 seven and one-half inches broad, oblong-lanceolate, occasionally 

 oblong-deltoid, pinnate, gradually or abruptly narrowed toward 

 apex : apex pinnatifid, long-acuminate : pinnae twelve to twenty- 

 one pairs, alternate or opposite, sessile, parting readily from 

 rachis, elUptic-lanceolate, acuminate, deeply pinnatifid, the 

 lower sometimes pinnate at base, basal pair usually introse : seg- 

 ments oblong or obUque, obtuse, entire or sometimes toothed: 



