bluish-green, pale underneath, once, or below twice,
pinnate; _pinnæ_, upper ones long and narrow, lower
ones usually with one to four pairs of broadly linear
_pinnules_; _sporangia_ bordering the pinnæ, bright brown
at maturity; _indusium_ formed by the reflexed margin of
the frond.
_Sterile fronds._--Usually much smaller than the fertile
and less abundant; _pinnæ_ oblong, entire, or slightly
toothed.
The Purple Cliff Brake is one of the plants that rejoice in
un-get-at-able and perilous situations. Although its range is wider
than that of many ferns, this choice of inconvenient localities,
joined to the fact that it is not a common plant, renders it likely
that unless you pay it the compliment of a special expedition in its
honor you will never add it to the list of your fern acquaintances.
But when all is said we are inestimably in debt to the plants so rare
or so exclusive as to entice us out of our usual haunts into theirs.
Not only do they draw us away from our books, out of our houses, but
off the well-known road and the trodden path into unfamiliar woods
which stand ready to reveal fresh treasures, across distant pastures
where the fragrant wind blows away the memory of small anxieties, up
into the hills from whose summits we get new views.
[Illustration: PLATE X
PURPLE CLIFF BRAKE
_a_ Portion of fertile frond]
Although the Purple Cliff Brake grows, I believe within fifteen
miles of my home in Albany, I never saw the plant until this summer
some hundred miles nearer the centre of the State. During a morning
call I chanced to mention that I was anxious to find two or three
ferns which were said to grow in the neighborhood. My hostess told me
that twenty-five years before, on some limestone cliffs about eight
miles away, she had found two unknown ferns which had been classified
and labelled by a botanical friend. Excusing herself she left me and
soon returned with carefully pressed specimens of the Purple Cliff
Brake and the little Rue Spleenwort, the two ferns I was most eager to
find. Such moments as I experienced then of long-deferred but peculiar
satisfaction go far toward making one an apostle of hobbies. My
pleasure was increased by the kind offer to guide me to the spot which
had yielded the specimens.
One morning soon after we were set down at the little railway station
from which we purposed to walk to the already-mentioned cliffs. We
were not without misgivings as we followed an indefinite path across
some limestone quarries, for a plant may easily disappear from a
given station in the course of twenty-five years. In a few moments
the so-called path disappeared in a fringe of bushes which evidently
marked the beginning of a precipitous descent. Cautiously clinging
to whatever we could lay hold of, bushes, roots of trees or imbedded
rocks, we climbed over the cliff's side, still following the semblance
of a path. On our left a stream plunged nearly two hundred feet into
the ravine below. For some distance the eye could follow its silver
course, then it disappeared beneath the arching trees. On our right,
many miles beyond, through the blue haze which hung over the distant
valley, we could see the lake to which the stream was hurrying.
We could not surrender ourselves with comfort to the beauty of the
outlook, as our surroundings were not such as to put us altogether at
ease. Overhead hung great rocks, so cracked and seamed and shattered
as to threaten a complete downfall, while beneath our feet the path
which led along the face of the cliff crumbled away, so that it was
difficult in places to obtain any foothold. Having passed the more
perilous spots, however, we became accustomed to the situation and
turned our attention to the unpromising wall of rock which rose beside
us. From its crevices hung graceful festoons of Bulblet Bladder Fern,
and apparently nothing but Bulblet Bladder Fern. But soon one of the
party gave a cry and pointed in triumph to a bluish-green cluster
of foliage which sprang from a shallow pocket overhead. Even though
one had not seen the plant before, there was no mistaking the wiry
purplish stalks, the leathery, pinnately parted, blue-green fronds,
and, above all, the marginal rows of bright brown sporangia peculiar
to the Purple Cliff Brake. Soon after we found several other plants,
all of them decidedly scraggly in appearance, with but few green
fronds and many leafless stalks. Occasionally a small sterile frond,
with broader, more oblong pinnæ, could be seen, but these were in the
minority. A number of very young plants, with little, heart-shaped
leaves altogether unlike the mature fronds, were wedged in neighboring
crannies.
As our eyes grew more accustomed to the contour and coloring of
the cliffs, the success of the day was completed by the discovery
of several specimens of the little Rue Spleenwort with tiny fronds
flattened against the rock.
When next I saw the Purple Cliff Brake it seemed to me quite a
different fern from the rather awkward plant, the mere sight of which
I had welcomed so eagerly that any unfavorable criticism of its
appearance seems ungrateful.
[Illustration: "The unpromising wall of rock which rose beside us."]
Again it sprang from limestone cliffs, even more remote and
inaccessible though less dangerous than those where I saw it first.
These cliffs were so shattered in places that the broken fragments lay
in heaps at their base and on the projecting ledges. Here and there
a great shaft of rock had broken away and stood like the turret of a
castle or the bastion of a fort. Among the shattered fragments high
up on the cliff's side the Purple Cliff Brake grew in a luxuriant
profusion that was amazing in view of the surroundings. The rigid,
erect fronds formed large tufts of greenish-gray foliage that, at
a little distance, so blended with their rocky background as to be
almost indistinguishable. The fronds usually were much more compound
than those I had seen a few weeks before. The separate plants had a
vigorous, bushy appearance that did not suggest the same species.
Many of the pinnæ were so turned as to display the ripe sporangia,
which formed a bright-brown border to the pale, slender divisions.
Here, too, the small sterile fronds were very rare.
[Illustration: More compound frond of Purple Cliff Brake
Sterile frond]
Growing from the broken rocks in among the Purple Cliff Brake were
thrifty little tufts of the Maidenhair Spleenwort. This tiny plant
seemed to have forgotten its shyness and to have forsworn its love for
moist, shaded, mossy rocks. It ventured boldly out upon these barren
cliffs, exposing itself to the fierce glare of the sun and to every
blast of wind, and holding itself upright with a saucy self-assurance
that seemed strangely at variance with its nature.
Near by a single patch of the Walking Leaf climbed up the face of the
cliff while, perhaps strangest of all, from the decaying trunk of a
tree, which lay prostrate among the rocks, sprang a single small but
perfect plant of the Ebony Spleenwort, a fern which was a complete
stranger in this locality, so far as I could learn.
17. CHRISTMAS FERN
_Aspidium acrostichoides_ (_Dryopteris acrostichoides_)
New Brunswick to Florida, in rocky woods. One to two and a
half feet high, with very chaffy stalks.
_Fronds._--Lance-shaped, once-pinnate, fertile fronds
contracted toward the summit; _pinnæ_ narrowly
lance-shaped, half halberd-shaped at the slightly stalked
base, bristly-toothed, the upper ones on the fertile
fronds contracted and smaller; _fruit-dots_ round, close,
confluent with age, nearly covering the under surface of
the fertile pinnæ; _indusium_ orbicular, fixed by the
depressed centre.
Of our evergreen ferns this is the best fitted to serve as a
decoration in winter. No other fern has such deep-green, highly
polished fronds. They need only a mixture of red berries to become a
close rival to the holly at Christmas-time.
[Illustration: Portion of fertile frond]
Wrapped in a garment of brown scales, the young fronds of the
Christmas Fern are sent into the world early in the spring. When
we go to the woods in April to look for arbutus, or to listen to
the first songs of the robin and the bluebird, we notice that last
year's fronds are still fresh and green. Low down among them, curled
up like tawny caterpillars, are the young fronds. The arbutus will
have made way for pink and blue and white hepaticas, for starry
bloodroot, and for tremulous anemones; thrushes and orioles will
have joined the robins and the bluebirds before these new-comers
present much of an appearance. When the tender, delicately green
fronds are first unrolled they contrast strongly with their polished,
dark-green, leathery companions.
[Illustration: Christmas Fern]
In this plant the difference is quite conspicuous between the fertile
and the sterile fronds. The sterile ones are shorter and apparently
broader, while the fertile are tall, slender, and noticeably
contracted by the abundantly fruiting pinnæ near the apex.
[Illustration: Narrow-leaved Spleenwort]
18. NARROW-LEAVED SPLEENWORT
_Asplenium angustifolium_
Canada to Kentucky, in moist woods. Two to four feet high.
_Sterile fronds._--Thin, smooth, lance-shaped, perishable,
once-pinnate.
_Fertile fronds._--Taller, narrower, longer-stalked;
_pinnæ_ more narrowly lance-shaped than on sterile fronds;
_fruit-dots_ linear, a row on each side the midvein;
_indusium_ slightly convex.
If we make an expedition to the woods early in July we may, perhaps,
find some plants of the Narrow-leaved Spleenwort. At this season they
are specially attractive, with smooth, delicate, pale-green fronds, so
recently unfolded as to be full of little undulations, which they lose
more or less at maturity, and which are as indicative of youth as the
curves and dimples of a baby.
[Illustration: PLATE XI
NARROW-LEAVED SPLEENWORT
_a_ Magnified pinna of fertile frond]
Late in August the plant has reached a stately height, perhaps of
three or four feet. The fronds are still smooth and delicate to a
degree unusual even in ferns. But they wear a deeper green, and
their texture seems a trifle more substantial. Occasionally, though
rarely in the deeper woods, we find a frond which is conspicuously
longer-stalked, taller, narrower than the others, with pinnæ more
distant and more contracted. A glance at its lower surface discovers
double rows of brown, linear fruit-dots.
Though one of the largest of its tribe, the Narrow-leaved Spleenwort
suggests greater fragility, a keener sensitiveness to uncongenial
conditions, than any other of our native ferns. A storm which leaves
the other inhabitants of the forest almost untouched beats down its
fronds, tender and perishable even in maturity.
This very fragility, accompanied as it is with beauty of form and
color, in the midst of the somewhat coarse and hardy growth of the
August woods, lends the plant a peculiar charm.
I find it growing beneath great basswoods, lichen-spotted beeches, and
sugar maples with trunks branchless for fifty feet, soaring like huge
shipmasts into the blue above.
Almost the only flowers in its neighborhood, for in midsummer
wood-flowers are rare, are the tiny pink blossoms of the herb Robert,
that invincible little plant which never wearies in well-doing, but
persists in flowering from June till October, the violet-blue heads
of the almost equally untiring self-heal and the yellow pitchers of
the pale touch-me-not or jewel-weed. This plant, a close relative of
the more southern and better known spotted touch-me-not, grows in
great patches almost in the heart of the woods. The lack of flowers is
somewhat atoned for by the coral clusters of the red baneberry and the
black-spotted, china-like fruit of the white baneberry.
But ferns chiefly abound in these woods. Everywhere I notice the thin,
spreading frond and withered fruit-cluster of the Rattlesnake Fern, in
my experience the most ubiquitous member of the _Botrychium_ group.
More or less frequent are graceful crowns of the Spinulose Shield
Fern, slender shining fronds of Christmas Fern, dull-green groups of
Silvery Spleenwort and stately plumes of Goldie's Fern. As we draw
near the wood's border, where the yellow sunlit fields of grain shine
between the tall maple shafts, we push aside umbrella-like Brakes.
At the very limits of the woods, close against the rails, grows the
sweet-scented _Dicksonia_.
19. NET-VEINED CHAIN FERN
_Woodwardia angustifolia_
Swampy places from Maine to Florida, in wet woods near the
coast.
_Sterile fronds._--Twelve to eighteen inches high,
pinnatifid with minutely toothed divisions united by a
broad wing.
_Fertile fronds._--Taller than the sterile, once-pinnate;
_pinnæ_ much contracted; _fruit-dots_ in a single row each
side of the secondary midribs; _indusium_ fixed by its
outer margin, opening on the side next the midrib.
[Illustration: _a_]
The Woodwardias are associated in my mind with sea-air, pine-trees,
and the flat, sandy country near Buzzard's Bay, Mass. Both species
were met with in one walk not far from the shore.
[Illustration: _b_]
A little stream, scarcely more than a ditch, divided an open, sunny
meadow from a bit of evergreen wood, and on the steep banks of this
runlet grew the bright fronds of _Woodwardia angustifolia_, giving
at first glance somewhat the impression of _Onoclea sensibilis_. The
fronds of both are described as pinnatifid, and in this _Woodwardia_
we find the divisions minutely toothed (_a_), giving them a rough
outline which is wanting in _Onoclea sensibilis_. These are the
sterile fronds. Among them and taller than they are the fertile fronds
with very narrow divisions, covered on the lower side with the chains
of fruit-dots (_b_).
[Illustration: PLATE XII
NET-VEINED CHAIN FERN]
It is a handsome fern and very satisfactory to the novice in fern
hunting, because, taking fertile and sterile fronds together, it
cannot be confused with any other species.
Crossing the tiny stream, a path dim with the shade of low, dense
evergreens and soft and elastic underfoot from their fallen leaves,
leads through the woods. Here among the partridge-vine that runs over
the rocks, growing from the soft, spongy soil, are groups of the
sterile fronds only of this _Woodwardia_, charming little clumps of
fresh green that invite one to dig them up and plant them in boxes or
baskets for decorative purposes.
GROUP IV
FERTILE AND STERILE FRONDS LEAF-LIKE AND SIMILAR; SPORANGIA ON OR
BENEATH A REFLEXED PORTION OF THE MARGIN
20. BRAKE. BRACKEN. EAGLE FERN
_Pteris aquilina_
Almost throughout North America, in dry, somewhat open
places. One to two feet high ordinarily, occasionally much
higher.
_Fronds._--Solitary, one to two feet wide, cut into three
primary divisions which are twice-pinnate, widely spreading
at the summit of an erect, stout stalk; _sporangia_ borne
in a continuous line along the lower margin of the frond;
_indusium_ formed by the reflexed edge of the frond.
Of all ferns the Brake is the most widely distributed. It occurs
in one form or another in all parts of the world. With us it grows
commonly from one to two feet high, occasionally higher. In Oregon it
attains a height of six or seven feet, in the Andes of fourteen feet.
It is a vigorous and often a beautiful and striking plant, growing
abundantly on sunny hill-sides and in open woods.
In the spring or early summer its solitary spreading frond,
light-green and delicate in color, might almost be confused with the
Oak Fern. Later its green takes on a dark, dull shade, and its general
aspect becomes more hardy than that of any other fern.
[Illustration: Brake]
The Brake is believed to be the "fearn" of the early Saxons and to
have given this prefix to many English towns and villages, such as
Fearnhow or Farnhow, Farningham, etc.
It is one of the few ferns mentioned by name in general literature.
In the "Lady of the Lake" it is alluded to in the song of the heir of
Armandave:
"The heath this night must be my bed,
The Bracken curtain for my head."
_Pteris esculenta_, a variety of our Brake, is said to have been
one of the chief articles of food in New Zealand. It was called
"fern-root," and in Dr. Thompson's "Story of New Zealand" is spoken
of as follows: "This food is celebrated in song, and the young women,
in laying before travellers baskets of cooked fern-root, chant: 'What
shall be our food? Shall shellfish and fern-root? That is the root
of the earth; that is the food to satisfy a man; the tongues grow by
reason of the licking, as if it were the tongue of a dog.'"
[Illustration: Pinnule of Brake showing reflexed edges]
The titles Brake and Bracken are not always confined to their lawful
owner. Frequently they are applied to any large ferns, such as the
Osmundas, or even to such superficially fern-like plants as _Myrica
asplenifolia_, the so-called sweet fern.
There is a difference of opinion as to the origin of the plant's
scientific name, which signifies eagle wing. Some suppose it to be
derived from the outline of the heraldic eagle which has been seen by
the imaginative in a cross-section of the young stalk. It seems more
likely that a resemblance has been fancied between the spreading frond
and the plumage of an eagle.
The Brake turns brown in autumn, but does not wither away till the
following year.
21. MAIDENHAIR
_Adiantum pedatum_
Nova Scotia to British Columbia, south to Georgia and
Arkansas, in moist woods. Ten to eighteen inches high.
_Fronds._--Forked at the summit of the slender black and
polished stalk, the recurved branches bearing on one side
several slender, spreading pinnate divisions; _pinnules_
obliquely triangular-oblong; _sporangia_ in short
fruit-dots on the under margin of a lobe of the frond;
_indusium_ formed by the reflexed lobe or tooth of the
frond.
For purposes of identification it would seem almost superfluous to
describe the Maidenhair, a plant which probably is more generally
appreciated than all the rest of the ferns together. Yet, strangely
enough, it is confused constantly with other plants and with plants
which are not ferns.
[Illustration: A pinna of Maidenhair]
Perhaps the early meadow rue is the plant most commonly mistaken for
the Maidenhair. While it does not suggest strikingly our eastern
fern, its lobed and rounded leaflets bear a likeness to certain
species native to other parts of the country, notably to _A.
Capillus-Veneris_, the Venus-hair Fern of the southern States.
[Illustration: A pinnule of Maidenhair]
But it is not easy to convince a friend that he has made a mistake
in this regard. You chance to be driving by a bank overgrown with
the early meadow rue when he calls your attention to the unusual
abundance of Maidenhair in the neighborhood. To his rather indignant
surprise you suggest that the plant he saw was not Maidenhair,
but the early meadow rue. If he have the least reverence for your
botanical attainments he grudgingly admits that possibly it was not
the ordinary Maidenhair, but maintains stoutly that it was a more
uncommon species which abounds in his especial neighborhood. If
truly diplomatic you hold your peace and change the subject, but
if possessed by a tormenting love of truth which is always getting
you into trouble, you state sadly but firmly that our northeastern
States have but one species of Maidenhair, and that it is more than
improbable that the favored neighborhood of his home (for it is
always an unusually rich locality) offers another. The result of this
discussion is that mentally you are pronounced both conceited and
pig-headed. For a few weeks the plants in question are passed without
comment, but by another summer the rich growth of Maidenhair is again
proudly exhibited. Only in one way can you save your reputation and
possibly convince your friend. When correcting him, if you glibly
remark that _Adiantum pedatum_, our northeastern Maidenhair, is the
only species which has been found in this part of the country, that
_A. Capillus-Veneris_, the Maidenhair which somewhat resembles the
early meadow rue, can hardly be found north of Virginia, while _A.
tenerum_ is found only in Florida, and _A. emarginatum_ is confined
to the Pacific coast, you will have redeemed yourself, not from the
stigma of conceit, far from it, but from that of error. The glib
utterance of Latin names is attended with a strange power of silencing
your opponent and filling him with a sort of grudging belief in your
scientific attainments.
The truth is that the average layman who takes an interest in
plants is as sensitive regarding the Maidenhair as he is about his
recognition of an orchid. By way of warning what more need be said?
Though the Maidenhair has a wide range and grows abundantly in many
localities, it possesses a quality of aloofness which adds to its
charm. Even in neighborhoods where it grows profusely, it rarely
crowds to the roadside or becomes the companion of your daily walks.
Its chosen haunts are dim, moist hollows in the woods or shaded
hill-sides sloping to the river. In such retreats you find the
feathery fronds tremulous on their black, glistening stalks, and in
their neighborhood you find also the very spirit of the woods.
Despite its apparent fragility, the Maidenhair is not difficult to
cultivate if provided with sufficient shade and moisture.
[Illustration: Maidenhair]
22. HAIRY LIP FERN
_Cheilanthes vestita_ (_C. lanosa_)
Growing on rocks, Southern New York to Georgia. Six to
fifteen inches high, with brown and shining stalks.
_Fronds._--Oblong-lance-shaped, rough with rusty hairs,
twice-pinnate; _pinnæ_ rather distant, triangular-ovate,
cut into oblong, more or less incised pinnules;
_fruit-dots_ roundish; _indusium_ formed by the reflexed
margins of the lobes which are pushed back by the matured
sporangia.
Till a few years ago the most northern station for the Hairy Lip Fern
was supposed to be within the limits of New York City. The plant was
discovered, in 1866 or 1867, on Manhattan Island, near Fort Tryon,
growing on rocks with an eastern exposure. If one should visit this
station to-day he would find himself at 196th Street, in the city
of New York, some two hundred and thirty-three yards west of the
Kingsbridge road, and I fear there would be no trace of this to us
rare fern.
Since then the plant has been discovered close to the Hudson River at
Poughkeepsie.
Its narrowly oblong, dull-green fronds, more or less covered with
red-brown hairs, which give it a somewhat rusty appearance, spring
from the clefts and ledges of rocks.
[Illustration: PLATE XIII
HAIRY LIP FERN
_a_ A fruiting pinnule]
23. HAY-SCENTED FERN
_Dicksonia pilosiuscula_ (_D. punctilobula_)
Two to three feet high; hill-sides, meadows, and thickets
from Canada to Tennessee.
_Fronds._--Ovate-lance-shaped, long-tapering, pale-green,
thin and very delicate in texture, slightly glandular and
hairy, usually thrice-pinnatifid; _pinnæ_ lance-shaped,
pointed, repeating in miniature outline of frond;
_pinnules_ cut again into short and obtuse lobes or
segments; _fruit-dots_ each on an elevated globular
receptacle on a _recurved toothlet_; _indusium_ cup-shaped,
open at the top.
In parts of the country, especially from Connecticut southward, the
Hay-scented Fern is one of the abundant plants. Though not essentially
a rock-loving plant, it rejoices in such rocky, upland pastures as
crown many of our lower mountain ranges, "great stretches of grayish
or sage-green fields in which every bowlder and outcrop of rock is
marked by masses of the bright-green fronds of _Dicksonia_, over
which the air moves lazily, heavy with the peculiar fragrance of this
interesting fern." Its singularly delicate, tapering, pale-green
fronds, curving gracefully in every direction, rank it among our most
beautiful and noticeable ferns. Often along the roadsides it forms
great masses of feathery foliage, tempting the weary pedestrian or
bicycler to fling himself upon a couch sufficiently soft and luxurious
in appearance to satisfy a sybarite. But I can testify that the
Hay-scented Fern does not make so good a bed as it promises.
[Illustration: PLATE XIV
HAY-SCENTED FERN
_a_ Early stage of fruiting pinnule]