PERNS AND FERN-HUNTING. 
9 
recognition. The difference between Ferns and Flowering 
Plants consists, then, in the former bearing, instead of flowers, 
and eventually seeds, small, brownish or yellow patches upon 
the back of their fronds, which consist of innumerable 
spores, contained in microscopically small, stalked pods or 
capsules ; and it is according to the character of these patches 
that botanists have divided the species, as well as they could, 
from one another. Without entering very deeply into tech- 
nicalities, we will give a few hints for guidance in this 
direction. 
These patches are sometimes round and uncovered, as in 
the Polypody {Polypodium vulgare); covered with a round or 
kidney- shaped scale, as in the Shield Ferns {PolysticJium^) 
and Buckler Ferns {Lastreaf). They may form a margin all 
round the divisions of the frond, as in the Bracken {Pteris 
aquilina); appear in large, sausage-shaped masses, an inch in 
length, as in the Hartstongue {Scolopendrium vulgare)-, or in 
several other ways, which will be described later on, in con- 
nection with each species, enough having now been said to 
give the student the clue to their general recognition, and 
to enable him to know one special characteristic of a Fern, 
by which mature plants may infallibly be discriminated. 
Young Ferns, or full-grown barren ones, need some other 
distinctive feature, and we find this in another character — 
viz., that the frond of a Fern develops by a process of 
uncoiling itself, it and all its divisions, in their early stages, 
being coiled up upon themselves like a watch-spring — a pecu- 
liarity shared by so few other plants that the exceptions may 
be ignored, while the only exceptions to the rule among our 
British Ferns are the Adderstongue {Ophioglossum vulgatum) 
and Moonwort {Botrychium Lunar ia), in which the fronds are 
straight at all periods of growth. 
These are the two most obvious differences between Ferns 
and other plants, and should be sufficient to enable the 
beginner to be sure of his ground so far; the descriptions in 
the ensuing chapters of the various species will enable him 
Syn. Aspidium. 
t Syn. Nephrodium. 
