HART'S-TONGUE. 5 1 



Hart's-tongue (Scolopendrium vulgare). 



The general idea of a fern is a plant whose leaves are more 

 or less intricately dissected, and therefore young plants of 

 Beaked Parsley and other umbelliferous plants are often 

 gathered as ferns. On the other hand the fronds of the 

 Hart's-tongue are as frequently passed over as belonging to 

 "some kind of Dock," because they are quite undivided and 

 strap-shaped. 



Springing from a short, stout, and more or less erect root- 

 stock, these fronds grow in a tuft, and vary ordinarily from a 

 foot to two feet in length, including the stout scaly stipes, but 

 depauperated specimens may sometimes be found on dry walls 

 only four or five inches in length, whilst on moist ditch banks 

 and about wells and springs they may measure over three feet. 

 Such specimens common in Cornwall and the South of Ireland 

 have a very fine appearance when growing at a height of four 

 or five feet on a moist woodland bank where their broad fronds 

 hang mainly downwards, a few growing erect adding to the 

 imposing character of the effect (Plates 47, 52, 54). 



But little further description of the frond is needed, yet it 

 may be added that its margins are almost parallel, the heart- 

 shaped base being slightly broader and the last few inches at 

 the further extremity tapering to a tip. It is stout and firm in 

 texture, plane in the small narrow varieties, but undulating at 

 the margins in the large broad examples. The veins start out 

 at right angles from the thick midrib, and fork on their way to 

 the margin, the branches often uniting with their neighbours. 

 Though not to be classed as an evergreen fern, the Hart's- 

 tongue is in evidence continuously, for its old fronds do not die 

 until the new have expanded. 



There is a good deal of variation to be discovered in the wild 

 Hart's-tongues quite apart from the matter of size. A common 

 departure from the type is the branching of the rachis. This 



