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The segments of the pinnæ vary much in shape and
much more in cutting. They are roundish-oval, ovate, rhomboid
ovate, or ovate-lanceolate in different forms; and are
sometimes merely dentate with short and obtuse teeth (van
dentata)\ or more deeply toothed with narrow teeth (var. an-
gustatd)\ or are irregularly laciniate with still narrower teeth,
the frond at the same time being narrow, and the segments
scarcely distinct from each other (var. laciniata of Mr. Davenport).
Milde gives seventeen forms and varieties.
The indusium is either rounded or ovate; sometimes
ovate with a narrow beak-like point, which is laciniate at the
tip. It rests directly on the fertile veinlet, and at first covers
the rounded sorus, but is at length pushed back by the
ripening sporangia, and is often at last entirely concealed by
them. The spores are ovoid and usually muriculate.
Cystopteris alpina has the fronds more finely compound,
and the lobules are generally cmarginate, the veinlet running
to the indentation. It has not, so far as I know, been collected
on this continent, but may occur in the far North-
West.
Plate LIIL , Fig. 1 - 8 .— Cystopteris fr a g ilis . Fig. i is from New
Haven, and is nearly typical; Fig. 2 is a pinnule, enlarged; Fig. 3, an
indusium, seated on a veinlet, and covering a fruit-dot ; F ig 4 is a
spore ; Fig. 5 is a pinna of what is called var. dentata ; I'ig. 6,
\Ni. angustata; Fig. 7, a form with incised segments; Fig. 8 var. laciniata,
of Mr. Davenport.
H i !
P l a t e LIII. — F ig . 9 - 1 2 .
C Y S T O P T E R IS MONTANA, B e r n h a r d i .
Mountain Cystopteris.
C y s t o p t e r i s Mo n t a n a : — Root-stock creeping, cord-like
and very slender, scaly near the apex; stalks scattered, delicate,
four to ten inches long, bearing a few ovate scales,
especially near the base; fronds three to five inches long,
broadly deltoid or pentagonal-ovate, thin-membranaceous, three
or four times pinnate; rachises all narrowly winged; lowest
pinnæ unequally deltoid-ovate, much larger than the second
pair, which is larger than tlie third ; ultimate pinnules oblong
or ovate, pinnately incised with toothed lobes, the teeth
mostly emarginately bidentate; veins pinnated, the superior
basal veinlets soriferous near the middle; indusia very deli-
cate, ovate, cucullate, irregularly toothed towards the apex.
Cystopteris mmitana, B e e m ia e d i , in Schraders Neues Journ. f. d. Bot-
anik, ¡., part ii., p. 2 6 . — L in k , “ Hort. Berol., ii., p. 2 3 1 ; ’ ’ Bil.
Hort. Berol., p. 4 7 .— H o o k e r , FL Bor. Am., ii., p. 2 6 0 ; Sp.
Fil., i., p. 2 0 0 ; Brit. Ferns, t. 25. — M o o e e , Brit. Ferns, Nature
Printed, t. xlv!., G ; Index Fil., p. 2 8 3 . — Kocti, Syn. FI.
Germ, et Helvet., ed. iii., p. 7 3 5 . — H o o k e r & B a k e r , Syn,
Fil., p. 10 4 . — E aton, Ferns of the South-West, p. 3 3 7 .
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