128 The Fern Lover's Compaxiox 



It prefers deep woods and shaded banks. Ne-n-foundland 

 to Alaska and southward to the mountains of Virginia. 

 July. 



THE FRAGRANT FERN 



Aspidiiim fragrans. Xephrbdtum fragrans 

 Thelypteris fragrans. Dryopteris fragrans 



Fronds four to twelve inches high, glandular-aromatic, 

 narrowly lanceolate and twice pinnate or nearly so. 

 Pinnfe olilong-lanceolate, pinnate or deeply pinnatifid. 

 Pinnules toothed or entire nearly covered beneath with 

 the large, thin, imbricated indusia which are orbicular with 

 a narrow sinus, having the margins ragged and sparingly 

 glanduliferous. Stipe short and chaffy. 



The fragrant fern grows on high cliffs among the 

 mountains of northern New England. It is reported from 

 scattered stations in northern Maine, from north of the 

 White ^Mountains and from Sunapee Lake in New Hamp- 

 shire, and in the Cilreen ^Mountains south to central Ver- 

 mont, New Brunswick and to Minnesota. Found also in 

 Alaska and Greenland. This much-coveted fern has a 

 singularly sweet and lasting fragrance, compared by some 

 to strawberries, by others to new-mown hay and sweet 

 brier lea\'es. We have seen herbarium specimens that were 

 mildly and pleasantly odorous after several years. When 

 growing the fern may be tested "by its fragrance, its sticki- 

 ness and its beautiful brown curls." Evergreen. Spores 

 ripen the middle of August. 



