4G 
FERNS : BRITISH AND FOREIGN. 
varies greatly in length, and is either simple or branched ; 
when very short and branched it forms tufts ( caspitose ), and 
when very long ( surculose ) it usually climbs on trees 
( scandent ). Very rarely it is erect ( subfrutescent ). Its point 
of growth is always evidently (often considerably) in ad- 
vance of the undeveloped fronds ; and the fronds themselves 
are produced singly from special, more or less distant, 
points on its sides, termed nodes, at which they are arti- 
culated. 
Sarmentum, a tough slender running stem, rooting like a rhizome, 
and either epigaeous or hypogceous, but differing in having 
the bases of the fronds adherent and continuous with it, 
and in its point of growth being coincident with, or scarcely 
ever in advance of, the undeveloped frond. 
Cauda', an erect or reclining ( decumbent ) stem, either simple or 
tufted ( ccespitose ), through the growth of offsets, or rarely 
sending out long running shoots, which root at their ex- 
tremity {stolonifcrous\ It is often very small, scarcely 
rising above the earth, but generally more or less elevated, 
and sometimes forms a cylindrical trunk ( arborescent ), oc- 
casionally 50 or more feet high, which, in many species, is 
thickened by the growth of numerous aerial, outgrowing, 
■wiry roots. And it bears a crown of usually adherent 
fronds, developed in a spiral series, upon its apex. 
FRONDS. 
The fronds of Ferns are either barren or fertile. In the great 
majority the latter do not differ very much from the former, though 
they are generally rather narrower in all their parts. But some- 
times they are very evidently different on the same plant, the 
barren presenting the ordinary leafy appearance, and the fertile 
being decidedly contracted, occasionally so much so that the leafy 
part is entirely absent, or in some the two kinds are combined in 
the same frond, the fertile portion being contracted, and the barren 
leafy. 
When young the fronds are involutely coiled, in the manner of 
a watch-spring, and gradually uncurl during the period of growth 
(circinate) ; rarely straight, as in Ophioglosscee. 
