CHAPTER XXL 



GLEICHENIA, Smith. 

 (Grlei-clie'-ni-a.) 

 Umbrella and Bead Ferns. 



HIS genus, dedicated to the memory of W. F. G-leichen, 

 a German botanist who hved towards the end of the eigiiteenth 

 century, contains about thirty species of ornamental, stove 

 and greenhouse Ferns, all of which are provided with running 

 or creeping rhizomes (prostrate stems), from which the fronds 

 are produced at longer or shorter intervals according to the species. In 

 Hooker and Baker's " Synopsis Filicum," GleicJienia forms Genus 2, and, 

 with the exception of Platyzoma, comprises all the Ferns contained in the 

 sub-order Gleicheniacew of Brown. The plants are easily distinguished from 

 all other Ferns by their peculiar mode of growth (already described at 

 p. 63, Vol. I.). Their pinnae (leaflets) are deeply pinnatifid (cut very nearly 

 to the midrib), and furnished with small segments, either of a pecuHarly 

 concave nature and suborbicular (nearly round in shape), or pectinate (in 

 form of a comb), with elongated lobes. 



Gleichenia is divided into two very distinct sections, as follow : 

 EuGLEiCHENiA (Eu-glei-che'-ni-a) (true Gleichenias), Brown. In these the 

 sessile sori (stalkless spore masses), composed of few capsules, usually two to 

 four, are disposed singly at the extremity of a veinlet on the superior base 

 of a lobe of the leaflets, which in this case are uniformly small and roundish. 



Meetensia (Mer-ten'-si-a), Fresl. Although the distinganshing character, 

 which resides in the mode of fructification, is, in the plants belonging to this 



