



24 THE BRITISH FERNS. 
pinnatifidly lobed, with distinct blunt teeth. When first found 
these confluent pinnules were also considerably reduced in size, and 
the frond was smaller. The more perfect and vigorous fronds now 
produced, have the pinnules more regular in position, and mostly with 
a narrow attachment, though connected by the margined rachis, 
The perfect basal anterior pinnules are stipitate, ovate, deeply pin- 
natifid, the segments rather obovate, with a few coarse acute teeth ; 
the other pinnules are similarly lobed and toothed but smaller, 
and in some cases depauperately so. The sori are scattered and 
irregular, and produced on the lobes near the base of their anterior 
margin, but distant from the midrib. Occasionally, as seen in our 
figure, a pinna is met with reduced to an awl-shaped rib. This 
very remarkable form was found by Mr. A. Tait, of Edinburgh, * in 
the seam of a perpendieular rock, on the side of one of the pine- 
covered mountains near Dunkeld," in 1853. [Plate LIII B; 
LIII bis, A.] 
2. alatum (M.). A dwarf variety, with something of the aspect of 
marinum, but much more confluent. The fronds are of drooping 
habit, delicate in texture, lanceolate, with small deflexed lower 
pinnae; the pinne rather more than an inch long in the centre of the 
fronds, narrowing from the broad base to the blunt rounded apex ; 
pinnatifid nearly to the rachis at the base, more confluent upwards, 
so that the pinnules or segments are everywhere connected by a broad 
distinct wing to the rachis. The pinnules are crowded, and eyen over- 
lapping, as broad above as below, the apex rounded, and the margin 
notched with acute prominent teeth. The sori are short, and in the 
specimens we have seen confined to the lowest veins in each segment. 
It was found a year or two since on Loch-na-gar in company with 
Polypodium alpestre, and is in the possession of Mr. A. Tait, of 
Edinburgh. [Plate LIII bis, B.] 
9. marinum (M.). This variety, sometimes called Dickie's Lady 
Fern, is a small plant, generally to be known by the elliptic-lanceolate 
outline of its fronds and by its crowded oblong pinnules, which are con- 
nected at the base, and notched with blunt shallow teeth, which latter 
in many fronds are, for the most part, simple and regular. It differs 
also- from the usual forms of the species in having the fronds spread- 
ing or decumbent in habit. The scales produced at the base of the 

