MAIDENHAIR SPLEENWORT. 37 



Maidenhair Spleenwort (Aspleniiim trichomanes). 



It is somewhat unfortunate that the word Maidenhair has 

 been used in the popular names of three of our ferns, with the 

 result that there is a certain amount of uncertainty, sometimes 

 confusion, in speaking of them to those who are not acquainted 

 with the scientific names. This species, at least, can claim a 

 long title to the name, for in Turner's " Herball" (1568) there 

 is an unmistakable portrait of it with the name " English 

 Mayden's Heare." But to call it English Maidenhair is to 

 imply that Adiantum capillus-'veneris is not a native ; so we 

 think Maidenhair Spleenwort the more distinctive name the 

 other not being a Spleenwort. Here again, however, a similar 

 difficulty crops up with regard to the popular name of Asplenium 

 adiantum-nigrum the Black Maidenhair Spleenwort and in 

 that case we counsel the omission of the word Maidenhair 

 altogether, on grounds that will be stated in a later page. 



In the Maidenhair Spleenwort we have a frond that is very 

 slender and long, from six to fifteen inches long, according 

 to locality, the leafy portion being from one-third to three- 

 quarters of an inch broad, and broken up into from seven 

 to twenty pairs of dark-green pinnae, with, of course, an odd 

 pinna terminating the rigid, dark-brown, or black, polished 

 and keeled rachis. The pinnae are glossy, evergreen, of 

 roundish-oblong or oval shape, the edges with rounded teeth. 

 They are connected to the rachis by stalks so exceedingly 

 short that they are only visible upon a close examination. 

 When the pinnae have fulfilled their mission they fall, and 

 leave the rachis black and bare. It may have been the 

 sight of a plant from which most of the pinnae had fallen, 

 leaving a shock-head of stiff wiry stalks, that suggested the 

 name of " Mayden's Heare," but if so the mediaeval maidens 

 must have been very untidy. (Plate 36.) 



The midrib of the pinna is not quite central, and from it a 



