1862.] SCOLOPENDRIUM VULGARE. 297 



who says it grows in that locality in tolerable profusion. This 

 locality is about three miles east of Perth, and upwards of twenty 

 miles from the sea. This fine Fern, I am informed by Mr. Lamb, of 

 Perth (a lover and cultivator of Ferns), was collected this summer 

 by him in the rocky Den of Auchraedden, about three miles west 

 of the village of Aberdour, in Aberdeenshire, close to the sea- 

 side ; some of its fronds, he said, were most luxuriant, and exceeded 

 two feet in length ; the var. polyschides was also found there. 

 From the same locality he gathered specimens of Asplenium 

 marinum, a living plant of which from that place he gave to 

 me ; I potted it, and it is a thriving plant in my room window. 

 From the Den of Murrayshall, my friend Mr. Soutar also 

 brought examples of Cystopterifi fragilis, and a form of Lastrea 

 Filix-mas having its pinnae furcate at the extremities. In the 

 same Den, under the trees, he collected a fine example of 

 Hieracium aurantiacum. This rare plant is one of the disputed 

 or doubtful natives. I do not mean to enter the field of con- 

 test or controversy about it, but I think, from the many un- 

 suspicious-looking localities in which it is and has been so long 

 found in different parts of Great Britain, I cannot see much 

 consistency in excluding it from the list of native plants, and 

 admitting others of far less frequent and recent occurrence. 

 In the days of Don, it was found in " several woods in Banfi- 

 shire, and at Craigston, near Turriff, Coalston Woods, East 

 Lothian, and woods to the east of Kenmore." (See Hooker's 

 Fl. Scotica, p. 229.) 



I may remark that this is pre-eminently the age of Ferns. 

 Ferns engross the attention of both the horticulturist and the 

 botanist, — the former for gain, the latter for information; the 

 former by his skill and endeavours to produce numberless de- 

 viations ft'om a state of nature, the latter to determine, by his 

 examinations and observations, what of the many varied forms 

 can be considered a species, and what not. 



Most of our smaller British Ferns succeed very well in pots 

 placed on the window-sill. The larger species, in general, if 

 planted at the foot of a wall (north side) will endure the rigour 

 of our severest winter ; yet some few succumb. A plant of /Sco- 

 lopendrium vulgare which I had growing unprotected, perished 

 during the intense frost of 1860, when the thermometer on seve- 

 ral successive nights sank to zero. 



N.S. VOL. VI. 2 Q 



