Genus XI. PTEEIS, Linnoeus.
Pteris is the most common of all our Perns. I t is that
which occurs almost everywhere in woods and in sandy
wastes, often appropriating to itself the whole surface of the
ground, but seeming to possess the peculiarity of avoiding
chalky soil. It is a very variable plant in its appearance,
owing to differences in its size and development dependent
on the circumstances in which it grows. Sometimes in dry,
very sandy soil, the plant becomes a pigmy, not reaching a
foot in height, and being merely bipinnate. The opposite
extreme occurs when the plant is growing on a damp hedge-
bank in a warm, shady lane, where it attains eight or ten
feet in height, and is proportionately compound in its development.
Its more usual size is from three to four feet in
height. Under circumstances which favour the most luxuriant
development, this common and usually vulgar-looking
plant combines the most noble and graceful aspect, perhaps,
which is borne by any of our indigenous species, its fronds
scrambling up among the bushes which sustain them at the
base, while their graceful feathery-looking tops form, overhead,
a living arch of the tenderest green. The Pteris, or
Bracken, is known among the native Perns by having the