THE COMMON* MOON WORT. 



Stipes erect, smooth, cylindrical, hollow, succulent* having two or three vascular bundles embedded 

 in its tissue, its base surrounded by long brawn sheaths, which arc doubtless the persistent bases of 

 former fronds ; about half the height of the entire frond ; dividing at top iuto two branches, of which 

 one is leafy, the other fertile* 



Vernation plicate, or folded straight* the fertile branch clasped by the sterile. 



Fronds from three to eight or ten iuches high, firm, stout, fleshy. Sterile branch smooth, (lark 

 glaucous green, pinnate. Pinnat four to six or seven pair^ tlabcllate or lunate, the margins nearly entire, 

 or somewhat crenate, or more or less lobed ; sometimes partially fertile. Fertile brunch pinnate or 

 bipinnntc ; the narrow rachiform spikclets (whether answering to pinnrc or pinnules) fleshy, flattened, 

 and bearing on the face towards the sterile branch a double row of erect spore-cases, so that these 

 apikelcts are sccund, and they arc moreover more or less incurved, or Subcrcct Sometimes more than 

 one fertile branch is produced, and occasionally spore-caws occur on the edges of tho barren pinna. 



Venation of the barren pinna- (label la to-furcate, i. c. the vein enters at the base, and becomes forked 

 over and over again until the whole space is traversed by the contiguous slightly radiating veins and 

 venules that do not extend quite to the margin. 



Fructification occupying tho flattened rachiform divisions of the separate fertile branch of the frond. 

 Spore-caws sessile, standing erect t\ & at a right angle to tho plane of the segments, in two rows along 

 each of these segments near the margin ; smooth, spherical, without apparent rings or reticulations, 

 bursting transversely, golden brown when mature. Spores smooth, roundish, oblong or angular, 

 pale-coloured. 



Duration. Tho crowns ami roots are doubtless perennial The fronds are annual, growing up in 

 April or May, and becoming fully grown in June, afterwards gradually drying up and perishing with 

 the summer's drought. 



The ordinary state of the Moon wort may be known by the double row of fan-shaped pinna? which 

 form the sterile branch of its frond It is a plant not easily distinguished from tho herbage among 

 which it grows, and on that account is probably often passed over without recognition. 



The variety rubtceum, which is perhaps entitled to specific rank, differs in its broader triangular 

 twice-divided barren branch— as though the form of the fertile branch were transferred to the barren; 

 and by tho linear form of tho secondary divisions. It is reported to have been found near Buxton in 

 Derbyshire, and on the winds of Barry near Dundee, but very sparingly, Wc have not seen a native 

 specimen. Though the B. rutaceum is by no means an unlikely plant to occur in Great Britain, the fact 

 of its occurrence must, as yet, be regarded as doubtful. 



No very marked success has been met with in cultivating the Botrychitmu Mr. Newman regards it 

 as an underground parasite, which view is at least doubtful, as the plants have been dug out with the 

 utmost cai*e without any trace of adhesion to the roots of surrounding plants being discovered. The 

 difficulty of growing it, is probably after all chiefly owing to the almost unavoidable fluctuations of 

 moisture to which artificially-cultivated plants are subject* and which, judging from the natural sites in 

 which this plant grows, it is unable to bear. The best chances of success are to dig up the plants 

 while growing with sods of the natural soil large enough to enclose the roots uninjured, or to take them 

 with less soil at the dormant period, the jwsitioii of the plants having of course been previously 

 marked ; in either case to plant them in considerable masses of soil, made up so as to imitate that 

 from which they were taken as closely as possible, whether it be sandy loam or an unctuous |>eat, in 

 both which they occur. Care must be also taken to keep the soil cool, and moderately as well as equably 

 moistened. The plan of transplanting at the dormant ]>eriod is certainly most in accordance with 

 theoretical notions of success; and probably the shade aflbrded by other herbage such as grass, to the 

 surface of the soiI t would be found beneficial to the plants. 



