66 



THE FERN BULLETIN 



is so unlike the typical plant that for a long time it wan 

 thought to be a separate species. Similar forms are 

 found in the sensitive fern's ally, the ostrich fern, 

 and that form of the cinnamon fern named frondosa 

 is manifestly akin to them in origin. The common 

 rattle-snake fern {Botrychium Virginianum) fre- 

 quently exhibits such forms, though since it has but a 

 single frond, it must perforce change only a part of the 

 pinnae. Through the kindness of Messrs. James 

 Shepard and H. C. Bigelow, I am able to illustrate in 

 the frontispiece a specimen collected near New Britain, 



Sterile Pinna of Botrychium Virginianum Bearing Sporangia 



Conn, in which some of the normally fertile pinnae 

 have reverted to leafy parts, while an accompanying 

 drawing from a plant colected in Indiana by Mr. F. 

 C. Greene, shows the reverse of this in which some of 

 the leafy parts have become spore-bearing.. So well 

 are the principles underlying the production of these 

 reversions now known that several of them can be 

 made at will by the experimentor. 



In connection with this may be found the answer to 

 the question : which was first, the spore-bearing or 

 leafy parts of the fern ? Botanists are pretty well 

 agreed that ferns have arisen from some moss-like an- 

 cestor. All the evidence points toward this conclusion. 



