TI7 



tendency towards the light colour, but when transferred to 

 the open, a sunny situation such as it liad previously 

 occupied, that central portion of all the fronds which should 

 have been yellow remained quite healthy but became a 

 reddish brown, the edges remaining green, shewing thus that 

 the partial variegation was due to a partial constitutionrd 

 difference in the chlorophyllic response to direct sunshine. 



Should any of the members of the Society possess really 

 constant specimens which remain true under the ordinary 

 sheltered conditions and are not apparently handicapped in 

 any way by undue exposure, the writer would be happy to 

 receive fronds and particulars, so that some of the un- 

 certainty in this connection may be removed. Under 

 natural conditions, where Hartstongues are abundant on 

 old walls and in the woods and hedgerows, the yellow 

 colour pervading the fronds as seen in some collections is 

 extremely rarely seen, and is undoubtedly due in those 

 collections, as a rule, to something unfavourable to proper 

 development, a sort of chlorophyllic anemia. C. T. D. 



EFFECT OF ENVIRONMENT ON 



VARIATION. 



At Christmas, igo8, a very marked form of Hartstongue 

 was found by the writer at Babbacombe, near Torquay, 

 growing high up on a road-side wall. When noted it was 

 a fairly vigorous plant for its situation, having several 

 fronds six or seven inches long, all of which were very 

 ramose, being divided into numerous spreading narrow 

 segments, resembling stag-horns, and of hard tough tex- 

 ture. As it was tightly frozen into a mere chink, only as 

 much of the condex could be extracted by cutting to secure 

 the visible growth with a few rootlets, quite sufficient, 

 however, in this species to secure future growth under 

 proper culture. It was carefully potted and placed in a 

 Wardian case, and in the course of the following season 

 grew vigorously and developed a number of fronds. These 

 however, were of quite a different type to the original 



