
THE COMMON SCALE FERN. 201 
Fronds numerous, from an inch and a-half to six or eight inches 
long, fleshy-coriaceous; linear lanceolate, deeply pinnatifid, often 
pinnate below; deep green and smooth above, densely clothed 
beneath with ovate-acuminate, slightly ciliated, tawny reticulately 
venose, closely-imbricated scales. Lobes oblong, obtuse, sessile and 
adnate by their whole base when distinct, more usually dilated on 
both sides and connected at the base, margined with projecting 
scales of the under surface. 
Venation indistinct in consequence of the thick texture of the 
frond, consisting of a sinuous costa or midvein, which enters the 
lobe from near the lower angle; from this is given off, close to the 
base on its anterior side, a vein which is several times forked, while 
the rest of the veins are alternate and two or three times forked; 
the branches or venules anastomose here and there beyond the 
second furcation, near the margin, the ultimate marginal veinlets 
being usually free, but sometimes united. 
Fructification produced over the whole under surface. Sori linear 
oblong, borne on the anterior side of the anterior venules, above the 
first fork, except in the case of the lowest anterior vein, which is 
frequently bisoriferous, one sorus being as usual on the anterior side 
of its anterior venule, the other on the posterior side of its posterior 
venule towards the primary costa; they are at first hidden by the dense 
covering of scales, which eventually they burst through. Indusium 
obsolete, sometimes represented by a narrow membranous line or 
ridge. Spore-cases roundish obovate. Spores roundish or somewhat 
oblong, muricate. i 
Duration. The caudex is perennial. The fronds are persistent 
and long enduring, and the new ones appear about May, long before 
the older ones have perished. 
Among the British Ferns, this plant may be recognised by its 
dwarf tufted sinuate-pinnatifid thick-textured fronds, of which the 
upper surface is smooth and dark green, and the under surface in- 
vested with a close covering of tawny scales. The sori of this plant, 
as we have already remarked, are said to have: a narrow indusium 
behind them, and as the spore-cases grow laterally on the vein 
which forms the receptacle, it has, no doubt correctly, been considered 

