340 ASPLENIUM FONTANUM. 
of this are annually wasted, being thrown on the dunghill. The above- 
mentioned materials are far more likely to answer the purpose than the 
Bamboo, so much used in China for making paper. 
I shall conclude by briefly describing: another plant (the Pothos vw- 
lacea), admirably adapted for all descriptions of fine straw-plats, pes 
tieularly where strength, and richness of appearance are desired ; its 
plat will be found superior to the best Leghorn plat. This plant, al- 
though an epiphyte, and growing plentifully at the roots and on the 
tops of the highest trees, at an elevation on the mountains not under 
1000 feet, may readily be cultivated in woodlands and moist places. 
The part made use of is the petiole, or footstalk of the leaf, which 
grows from eighteen inches to two feet long, and readily divides into 
strips of any dimensions, and contains a strong fibre, which the com- 
mon plat made from the fan-palms does not, and seldom retains colour 
long. These advantages may tend to bring the plant into notice after 
awhile; and if, through my humble endeavours, any of the undeveloped 
resources of the country are brought into notice, a happy result will be 
effected. 
. ASPLENIUM FONTANUM, Br., a British Plant; by Sır W.J. HOOKER, 
K.H., ER, A., and L.S. 
In consequence of my having recently received, from near Cork, a 
specimen of a Fern, supposed to be Asplenium fontanum, Br.,—Polypo- 
. dium, L.—(but which proved to be a state of Cistopteris fragilis), I 
have been led to direct my attention to the consideration of this beau- 
. tiful species as a native of Great Britain. 
. Hudson is the first authority for its being so deemed (Flora An- 
. gliea, p. 456):—* Habitat in muris antiquis et rupibus, supra Hamer- 
. sham (or Agmondesham, Bucks,) Church, D. Bradney ; in locis saxosis, 
. prope Wybourn in Westmorlandia." To the first of these two locali- 
ties Sir James Smith, in ‘English Flora,’ adds the remark, ** Whence it 
was brought alive to Kew Gardens by the late Mr. Aiton,* from whom 
I have a specimen; but the church has been whitewashed, and the 
plant destroyed.” —TIn relation to the second locality Sir James Smith 
says, 7. c., “ Mr. Hudson gathered the same in a stony situation near 
d censi appears in the “Hortus Kewensis vol. iii. p. 463, as a native 
age Uu Ur P ea Se sp obe Se Wisi nid oc i Cono UT due capt RD 
