THE MALE FERN 
amateur, and the dissatisfaetion 
with frivolous distinctions, to the perplexity o 
doubt th at this is also the Dryopteris of Adan "The bot: Ed 5 мели pis Bi 
tnt eet ne ap dv ro 
De: Asa Gray. ОГ tho two. hamos applied to thes planta which have thus been supported by moderna 
botanical authority, we select that of Lastrea, which has been most widely adopted, and as avoiding 
much needless chang: old name of Aspidium, which some 
properly applied to species having peltate 
retain, and with which Roth’s 
Polystichum is nearly equivalent and cocval, seems mo 
indusia, ns ls suggested by Swartz himself, who uses tho terms peltate and umbilicate, before those of 
reform and dimidiate, all however being included by him. These, several names were judiciously 
distributed twenty years since—Aspidium to the netted-veined peltate Aspidiew ; Polystichum to the 
freo-veined peltate Aspidiew; and Lastrea to the free-veined reniform Aspidiew ; and no further 
change, at least for the British species, is now required 
When the species of Lastrea and Polystichum wero included under Aspidium they bore the English 
name of Shield Fern. It is however objectionable to use the same English name for different. genera 
and as the old namo of Shield Forn is more properly applied to the Polystichums, which are the most 
genuino Aspidia, wo have proposed in the Handbook of British Ferns, to use for the Lastreas, the 
equivalent name of Buckler Fern, which is here also adopted, 
‘The common Male Fern cannot well be mistaken for any other native species. It has been formerly 
confounded with Z. cristata, but the two have no very close aflinity, and the only resemblance occurs in 
а form of Fili-mas, not common, in which the lower pinne are triangular. The Incised variety is in 
some respects like Z. rigida, but obviously different in many others 
‘The Incised Male Fern—L. Рилхомдя 1xca—(Prare ХУ.) is altogether а larger and more striking 
plant than the normal form, more robust, averaging three or four feet, and sometimes reaching six feet 
in height, with a stipes of five or six inches. The fronds in unfolding liberate the point, which becomes 
nt Tike the curve of a shepherd's erook, as in the common plant; they are distinctly bipinnat 
lanceolate, not contracting abruptly near the apex. The pinn are elongate, tapering gradually to the 
apex. The pinnulos are somewhat less closely placed ; the basal ones notched, often deeply, on cach 
side their base, thus having a narrow attachment, elongately pyramidate-oblong, broadest at the base 
and with a narrowed though rounded apex ; the rest more broadly attached, and more equal in width 
the margins more or less deeply inciso-lobate, the lobes three to five-toothed. ‘The venation is more 
highly developed, thus: a vein is directed up the centre of each lobe, and this bears alternately 
several venules; but the sori are, notwithstanding, produced only on the anterior basal venule of 
ench faseicle, so that, as in the normal form, they are ranged in а single line on each side the midvein, 
commonly extending, however, much nearer to the apex of the pinmulo, "The indusium is here reniform 
in tho other, convex, entire, and persistent, ularly deformed monstrous leafy 
developments of this variety constitute the Aspidium depastum of Schkuhr. This variety is probably 
equally common with the type form, and appears as widely dispersed ; it is certainly found in the 
south and south-western, the midland and the northern counties of England; in Wales; in the east 
and south-west of Scotland ; in the Channel Isles; and about Kingstown, Dublin, Ireland, whence it has 
been sent to us by R. Esq. Our figure necessarily represents a small and therefore less 
characteristic specimen, 
The Dwarf Malo Fern—L. Ётых-мдв roxnt—(Pure XVII) is permanently smaller, and Jess 
Ч than the normal plant, It usually grows from nine inches to a foot in height, und rarely 
when very vigorous, reaches the height of а foot and a half, The stipes is two to three inches Jong, tho 
fronds lanceolate, pinnate ; the pinnae short, bluntish, and pinna 
