_Woodwardia areolàta. W. angustifòlia_
Root stocks creeping and chaffy. Sterile and fertile fronds unlike; sterile
ones nine to twelve inches tall, deltoid-ovate. Broadest at the base, with
lanceolate, serrulate divisions united by a broad wing. Veins areolate;
fertile fronds taller, twelve to twenty inches high with narrowly linear
divisions, the areoles and fruit-dots in a single row each side of the
secondary midrib, the latter sunk in the tissues.
This species is less common than the Virginia fern, but they often grow
near each other. We have collected both in the Blue Hill reservation near
Boston, and both have been found in Hingham, Medford, and Reading, and
doubtless in other towns along the coast. Mrs. Parsons speaks of finding
them in the flat, sandy country near Buzzard's Bay. The net-veined species
has some resemblance to the sensitive fern, but in the latter the spore
cases are shut up in small pods formed by the contracting and rolling up of
the lobes, whereas the chain fern bears its sori on the under side of long,
narrow pinnæ. Besides, the sterile fronds of the latter have serrulate
segments. As in the sensitive fern there are many curious gradations
between the fertile and sterile fronds, both in shape and fruitfulness.
Waters calls them the "_obtusilobàta_ form."
[Illustration: The Spleenworts 1. Narrow-leaved 2. Ebony 3. Rue 4. Scott's
5. Maidenhair 6. Green 7. Mountain]