[Illustration: Long Beech Fern. Phegopteris polypodioides]
[Illustration: The Long Beech Fern]
[THE FRAGRANT FERN]
Aspídium fràgrans. Nephròdium fràgrans
THELÝPTERIS FRÀGRANS. Dryópteris fràgrans
Fronds four to twelve inches high, glandular-aromatic, narrowly lanceolate and twice pinnate or nearly so. Pinnæ oblong-lanceolate, pinnate or deeply pinnatifid. Pinnules toothed or entire nearly covered beneath with the large, thin, imbricated indusia which are orbicular with a narrow sinus, having the margins ragged and sparingly glanduliferous. Stipe short and chaffy.
The fragrant fern grows on high cliffs among the mountains of northern New England. It is reported from scattered stations in northern Maine, from north of the White Mountains and from Sunapee Lake in New Hampshire, and in the Green Mountains south to central Vermont, New Brunswick and to Minnesota. Found also in Alaska and Greenland. This much-coveted fern has a singularly sweet and lasting fragrance, compared by some to strawberries, by others to new-mown hay and sweet brier leaves. We have seen herbarium specimens that were mildly and pleasantly odorous after several years. When growing the fern may be tested "by its fragrance, its stickiness and its beautiful brown curls." Evergreen. Spores ripen the middle of August.
