POLYPODIUM. 



107 



P. a. sporadocarpum — spor-ad-oc-ar'-pum (spore-fruited), Wittdenow. 



This variety, commonly met with in gardens under the name of P. glaucum, 

 is a native of South America, and is found most plentifully in Mexico. 

 According to Lowe, it was introduced into the Royal Gardens, Kew, in 1843. 

 If only the lovely colour of its foliage he taken into consideration, this variety, 

 which is the Phlebodium sporadocarpum of J. Smith and also of Moore and 

 Houlston, is certainly the handsomest of the group to which it belongs, being 

 of a feluish tint not even approached by any of the others. Its habit is not, 

 however, so elegant as that of the species, its fronds being borne on longer 

 and slenderer stalks ; the leaflets are also narrower and more distant from 

 each other than those of P. aureum, but they are of a thicker texture and are 

 bordered all round on their upper surface with small, white closely-set dots, 

 and forming a singular and pleasing contrast with the bluish ground-colour. 

 The fronds are also produced in greater abundance from a rhizome which 

 branches more freely than that of either the species or its other varieties. — 

 Lowe, Ferns British and Exotic, ii., t. 6. 



As purely decorative plants, P. aureum and its varieties are extremely 

 useful and may be utilised in various ways, their massive fronds producing 

 a striking contrast with those of other Ferns with which they are associated 

 in the warm Fernery. When planted out, the rhizomes grow apace and 

 produce fronds in abundance ; though usually seen on the surface of the soil, 

 they are also subterranean and have the property of extending underground 

 to very long distances, with articulated fronds disposed upon them at short 

 intervals. These plants may also be used with great advantage in hanging 

 baskets of large dimensions, either by themselves or intermixed with other 

 Ferns with finer foliage, or for covering Tree-Fern stems. Thus grown, their 

 thick, chaffy rhizomes show to perfection, the whiteness of the scales with 

 which their extremities are densely clothed being apparent, and contrasting 

 pleasingly with the golden colour of the scales of their other portions. 



The value of these Ferns for decorative purposes is sufficiently attested by 

 the fact that thousands of them annually find their way to Covent Garden 

 Market ; some growers, indeed, make quite a speciality of them, as much on 

 account of their rapid growth as because of their distinct habit. Although 

 the fronds have a natural tendency to be produced from a single rhizome, the 



