This is our most common species of Woodsia and it has a wider range than
the others, extending from Maine and Nova Scotia to Georgia and westward.
On rocky banks and cliffs. The sori of this species have a peculiar beauty
on account of the star-shaped indusium, as it splits into fragments. Var.
_angústa_ is a form with very narrow fronds and pinnæ. Highlands, New York.
The type grows in Middlesex County, Mass., but is rare.

(4) SMOOTH WOODSIA. _Woodsia glabélla_

Fronds two to five inches high, very delicate, linear, pinnate. Pinnæ
remote at the base, roundish-ovate, very obtuse with a few crenate lobes.
Stipes jointed, straw-colored. Hairs of the indusium few and minute.

[Illustration: Smooth Woodsia. _Woodsia glabella_ (Willoughhy Mountain, Vt.
G.H.T.)]

On moist, mossy, mostly calcareous rocks, northern New England, Mount
Mansfield, Willoughby, and Bakersfield Ledge, Vt., Gorham, N.H., also
Newfoundland, New York, and far to the northwest. Not very common. It
differs from the alpine species by the absence of scales above the joint.
As the name implies, the plant is smooth, except for the chaffy scales at
or near the rootstock, which mark all the Woodsias, and many other ferns,
and which serve as a protective covering against sudden changes in extremes
of heat and cold.

(5) OREGON WOODSIA. _Woódsia oregàna_

Fronds two to ten inches high, smooth, bright green, glandular beneath,
narrowly lance-oblong, bipinnatifid. Pinnse triangular-oblong, obtuse,
pinnatifid. Segments ovate or oblong, obtuse, crenate, the teeth or margin