VI. POLYSTICHUM. 
93 
traded. The fronds are persistent, and adherent at the 
base to the tufted caudex ; they are remarkably elegant, 
retaining their verdure throughout the winter, and the old 
undecayed fronds of preceding years, though dead and 
entirely discoloured, are 
usually found about the 
base of the plants. The 
whole plant is softer, 
more lax and delicate in 
texture, and more shaggy 
than in the nearly allied 
P. aculeatum. The stipes 
is from one-fourth to one- 
third the length of the 
frond, and is densely 
clothed with coarse red- 
dish rust-coloured chaffy 
scales, which also cover 
both the main and the 
secondary rachis, the 
scales becoming smaller 
upwards, and at length 
hair-like. The fronds are 
lanceolate and bipinnate, 
usually from two to three 
feet, but sometimes four 
or five feet high, the out- 
line generally broader 
than in P. aculcatum, 
and the habit pendent. 
A vigorous old crown 
frequently produces as 
[Polystichum angulare many as thirty or more 
ft and <y.] fronds, which, under any 
circumstances, from the laxity of then- habit, assume a 
beautiful and graceful attitude." The pinnae are numerous, 
elongate linear-lanceolate, distinct, often distant, four to 
five inches long. The pinnules are flat, somewhat crescent- 
shaped, and either acute or bluntiah, distinctly and often 
