THE SMOOTH ROCK SPLEENWORT. 
 Caudez short, erect, tufted, scaly. Scales subulato, dark brown, semi-transparent, the tissue striate 
anched, dark brown, tomentose 
with elongate parallel cells, iles slender, b 
en upwards, usually about one-third 
Stipes sl 
the length of the frond, furnished at the base with a few very small deciduous scales ; terminal and 
adhen 
int to the caudex. | each green, with a narrow elevated margin or wing throughout, the may 
extending nearly to the hase of the stipes. 
Vernation circinate 
n or twelve 
varying from about two and a half to 
Fronds aver ur or five inches in length, 
inches, rigid, dark green, smooth, erect or spreading, narrow-lanceolate, broadest above the middle, 
ower ones smaller, palmately three-lobed and more 
bipinnate, Pinna oblong-ovate, spreading ; the 
ules roundish 9 
distant; the uppermost ones oblong, and more crowded. Pin ovate, tapering to the 
base, the lover ones distinctly stalked on the narrowly-winged secondary rachis, the upper more decur 
rent; their margins deeply notched, with from two or three to five or seven coarse, angular, spinosely- 
mucronate teeth. 
Venation of the principal pinnules consisting of a flexuous midvein, sending off alternate simple 
veins, one of which is directed towards each tooth, and extends almost to its apes. 
Fructification on the back of the frond, most copious upwards, but extending nearly to the base 
‘Sori, or clusters of spore-cases, small, short oblong, from two to four on each pinnule, attached near 
the base of the veins on their anterior side ; at first distinct, but often becoming confluent and forming 
es over the centre of the pinnules ; indusiate, Jndusinm short oblong, white, 
large shapeless n 
usually straight behind, sometimes a little curved ; rounded, entire, and sometimes slightly wavy on 
the free margin. Spore-cases small, roundish, Spores angular, rough. 
Duration. "The caudex is perennial. ‘The fronds aro also persistent, the plant being evergreen, and 
continuing in growth the whole year, under favourable conditions. 
‘This Fern is readily known among the British Aspfenice, by its bipinnato fronds, taken in conjunction 
with their small stature, and the minuteness of their parts, six inches in length for the frond, and half 
an inch for the pinnas being rather above the average growth. Apart from this diserepaney in size, it 
very much resembles A. Zancoolatum, the structure of its parts being nearly identical, but in the latter 
the lower pinnæ do not diminish ju so marked a degree. 
anists continue to place this species in Athyrium, as originally proposed by Roth, but the 
plant is too nearly akin to A. lanceolatum to be separated from it, and the general structure of its sori 
is asplenioid not athyricid. ‘There is occasionally manifested a very slight tendency to produce the 
arcuate sori characteristic of Athyrium, but this does not occur 
in а sufficient degree to necessitate 
the removal of the species from Asplenium, with which in all other respects it so exactly accords, 
It is an casily-grown frame or greenhouse Fern, particularly desirable in a small collect 
а from its 
small size and evergreen habit. Tt sh 
ild be potted in well-drained porous so 
osod of turfy peat, 
with a small proportion of loam, and abundance of sand. The erown of the plant may be advantageously 
raised somewhat above the general surface in potting, by being wedged 
