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L a str ea P i l ix -mas, Presl.— The Male Fern. (Plate
vni.)
The Male Fern is so called from its robust appearance in
contrast with the more delicate, though similar. Lady Fern
or Filix-foemina. It is one of the species which grow up
annually, the fronds being destroyed by the frosts of winter,
unless the situation be very sheltered, when the old fronds
often remain green until the young ones are produced in
spring. It is a robust-growing plant, producing its fronds
in a tuft around a central crown, and when vigorous and
perfectly developed is a very striking object, though its
ornamental qualities are often unheeded, we suppose, on account
of its commonness. Surely, however, it is not wise
that objects imbued with that mystery—vitality, and being
intrinsically graceful and beautiful, should be despised because
a beneficent Creator has scattered them about our path
with a lavish hand ; they ought the rather, one would think,
to lead us to admire and adore !
The stipes of this Fern is densely scaly. The fronds
average about a couple of feet in height, and are of a broad
lance-shaped figure, and what is called bipinnate, though
less decidedly so than occurs in some other species, for here
it is those pinnules only which are nearest to the main rachis
"W. F.i.'-l, dc-1 oil lit R,KevB i- ITichola. iniyi