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Polypodium hexagonoptertím, M i c h a u x , FI. Bor.-Am., ii., p. 271.—S w a r t z ,
Syn. F il, p. 40. — W i l l d e n o w , Sp. PL, v., p. 200.— P u r s h , FI.
Am. Sept., ii., p. 659.— H o o k e r & G r e v j l l e , I c . Fil., t. c c x .—
L i n k , Fil. Hort. Berol., p. 13 2 .— T o r r e y , FI. New York, ii.,
p. 485.—G r a y , Manual, ed. i., p. 623: ed. ii., p. 590.— E a t o n ,
in Chapman’s Flora, p. 588. — H o o k e r , Sp. Fil., iv., p. 245.—
L a w so n . in Canad. Naturalist, i., p. 268. — H o o k e r & B a k e r ,
Syn. Fil., p. 309.
Polypodium Phegopteris, var. majus. H o o k e r , FI. Bor.-Am., ii,, p. 258.
H a b . — Moist woodlands, from Canada to L'lorida, and westward to
Iowa, Arkansas and Louisiana, not one of our commonest ferns, but
abundant in favorable localities, more particularly in the Middle and
Southern States. It has not been lound outside of North America.
D e s c r i p t i o n ; — The root-stock is sometimes nearly a foot
long, and creeps just beneath the surface of the ground. It
is about two lines in thickness. The newer portion is moderately
paleaceous, the scales being ovate, very delicate, and
distantly ciliate with straight unicellular hairs. The root-stock
is somewhat fleshy, and contains about five interior fibro-
vascular bundles.
The stalks are from half an inch to an inch apart. They
are continuous with the root-stock, and not articulated at the
base, as in Polypodium. For an inch or two at the base
they bear a few thin chaffy ciliate scales, like those of the
root-stock. In the living plant they are erect, green in color,
and terete, but in dried specimens they turn to a light straw- '
color, and are more or less furrowed. Their height is from
F E R N S O F n o r t h AM E R IC A . 149
a few inches to nearly two feet. At the very base they contain
two obliquely placed strap-like fibro-vascular bundles,
which presently unite and form a single one. A section of
this has the form of a V.
The frond, when pressed, forms almost a perfect equilateral
triangle in general outline, a large one being from ten to
twelve inches broad from tip to tip of the lowest pinnæ, and
about the same from these lower angles to the apex. In
living plants the two lowest pinnæ stand obliquely forward,
and are not in the general plane of the frond. The pinnæ
are lanceolate in shape, all the larger ones being broadest
in the middle and narrowed towards both the base and the
apex, which is acuminate. The upper pinnæ gradually become
smaller, and lose this lanceolate form, being no broader in
the middle than at the base. The uppermost pinnæ pass into
mere segments or lobes of the apex of the frond. The
principal pinnæ are pinnatifid into very numerous oblong obtuse
segments or lobes, the middle ones of the lowest pinnæ
an inch or two long, and pinnately lobed, the rest gradually
shorter and merely crenately serrate or even entire. The
basal lobes are adnate to the main rachis, and form an irregular
wing along both sides of it. The inferior basal lobes, in
fact, grow rather from the rachis than from the midribs of
the pinnæ, but those on the upper sides of the pinnæ receive
their midveins from the axils of the midribs. The wings
thus formed have suggested the specific name hexagonoptera ;
but it is very seldom that they form anything like a true
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