BEAUTIFUL FERNS. 
H7 
line tapers to a long and slender point, not so long as the prolon- 
gation of the walking-leaf, and very rarely, if ever, rooting at the 
apex.^ The fronds are mostly erect, sub-coriaceous or firmly 
membranaceous, smooth above, but with a few minute setulose 
scales beneath, deeply pinnatifid in the lower and middle portion, 
and sinuately lobed above, the long terminal portion undulate on 
the margins. The midrib is broad and well defined : it is winged 
throughout its length ; the wing narrow at the base of the frond, 
but constantly widening upwards. 
The lobes are irregularly roundish-ovate, sinuate, crenate or 
slightly toothed ; the lowest ones occasionally drawn out into an 
acuminate point an inch long. Most of the lobes are attached 
to the wing of the midrib by a broad base : the lower ones som.e- 
times have a short stalk. 
The veins are everywhere free : in the lower lobes, if these 
are acuminate, the veins are pinnately branched from a mid-vein ; 
elsewhere they are forked or dichotomous. The sori are mostly 
single, though here and there one will be diplazioid, — most com- 
monly the lowest one on the superior side of the lobe. The indu- 
sia are very delicate ; and the free edge is directed toward the 
middle of the lobe, excepting the indusia of the sori nearest the 
midrib, and these open toward the midrib. The sori are usually 
very full of sporangia, and, when ripe, nearly cover the back of the 
frond : even the narrow acumination bears a sorus at each undu- 
lation of the margin. Spores ovoid-bean-shaped, with reticulating 
ridges and an irregular winged border. 
* I find one or two instances of a slight enlargement of the apex, as if 
there were an attempt to form a proliferous bud. 
