200 
ASPIDIACE^. 
herbs for the most improper uses, or assigning to them the most 
marvellous powers : our old friend Gerarde, after many a kind 
warning to his readers against credulity, winds up his ‘ Herbal ’ 
with an avowal of his implicit faith in the Bernacle goose. 
The roots are extremely strong and tough ; they are of a dark 
brown colour, and penetrate very deeply into the earth ; the 
rhizoma is tufted : if in a favorable situation it elongates slightly 
every year, so that in very old plants it makes a decided ap- 
pearance above ground, and the crown of the rhizoma, whence 
spring the fronds, appears to be seated on a short stem ; it more 
often, however, assumes a pendant position, as represented at 
page 197, the crown of the rhizoma curving at the extremity, 
and the fronds growing in a nearly erect position. This elon- 
gation of the rhizoma in L. Filix-mas (a character still more 
decided in Athyrium Filix-femina), affords us a clew to that 
erect and elongated part which is called the ^Hrunk” of Tree 
Ferns. It is inconsistent with analogy to suppose that genera, 
which are so obviously allied in every other character, should 
be so totally different in this, as for one to possess a trunk and 
the other to be entirely without it. 
The fronds make their appearance in May : at first they are 
perfectly circinate, but after a few days the apex of each is libe- 
rated, and hangs down, the frond at this period possessing the 
bend w’hich characterises a shepherd’s crook, as represented at 
page 197. In this state it is very tender, and is generally cut 
down by the late frosts of spring ; the loss is, however, quickly 
supplied ; a second series of fronds make their appearance, and 
expanding at a more congenial time, arrive in safety at maturity. 
The fronds are mature in August, and last to the middle of win- 
ter quite uninjured : they are generally fertile, but plants are 
not of unfrequent occurrence which produce only barren fronds ; 
and these are generally larger, greener, and have the pinnules 
more deeply serrated than when fertile. The fronds vary from 
five to ten or more in number ; their position is nearly erect, or, 
perhaps, somewhat slanting, and radiating from a common cen- 
tre. The length of the fronds averages between two and three 
feet, and the stem is naked nearly one-third of its length, and 
very chaffy. 
