LOMARIA. 15 



Vill. Sibth. Struthiopteris Spicant, Weiss, Scop. — yS. Ja- 

 jjonica ; barren frond very broad in the middle scmipcllucid 

 its very short stipes and the base of the fertile stipes densely 

 villous with very long narrow subulate glossy aureo-nitent 

 subulate scales, the rest of the fertile stipes and the rachises 

 and young fertile pinnae paleaceous with shorter and scat- 

 tered scales (distinct species ?). Blechnum Spicant, C. 

 Wright in Herb, of the U. S. Pacific Expl. Exped. — 7. 

 elonyata; fronds 2^ feet long, segments acute sometimes 

 obscurely crenated. Lomaria crenata, Presl, Reliq. Hcenk. 

 p. 51. 



Ilab. Throughout Europe, it would appear, abundantly, from Norwegian Lap- 

 land {Wahlenbcrg) to Spain (Durieu) and the Islands of the Mediterranean, 

 Crete, Jleldreich, and to Madeira and the Azores and Teneriffe {WeOb, Bonrffeau), 

 which appears to be its southern limit in the northern hemisphere. It is found 

 in Middle Russia {Jnndz), in the Caucasian provinces, Koch and Ruprecht, Kam- 

 tschatka, Pallas and Ruprecht. — fi. Hakodadi, Japan, C. Wright, in Herb. Nostr. 

 — y. North-west America, chiefly in the Russian possessions. Island of Sitkha, 

 Eschscholtz ; Nutka Sound, Ihcnke ; Juan de Fuca, Brackenridge ; Observatory 

 Inlet, Dr. Scolder ; Port Etches, Prince William's Sound, Hinds. Upon the au- 

 thority of a specimen in Bory de Saint-Vincent's herbarium, said to be gathered 

 by Mr. Ricke at the Cape of Good Hope, it finds a place among tiie ' Filices 

 Capenses' of Schlechtendal and of Rawson and Pappe ; but the statement has 

 never been confirmed. 



Every European botanist is familiar with the Fern now under consideration, 

 for no species is more general in this quarter of the globe ; but, eastward, it 

 seems to become rare in Russia, and Lithuania is perhaps its limit in that di- 

 rection. I do not find it recorded as a Siberian plant, till it makes its ajipear- 

 ance in Kamtschatka (stretching south to Japan) ; and crossing the sea of 

 Kamtschatka, in nearly the same parallel of latitude, it again occurs at the 

 southern extremity of the Russian possessions in N.W. America, and the northern 

 extremity of the British possessions there : nor does it appear to exist in any 

 other spot of that vast continent — nowhere in the United States. Mr. Thomas 

 Moore, in his ' British Ferns, Nature-printed,' has indeed, in his accurate ac- 

 count of this plant, expressed an opinion that a Brazilian species, Lomaria 

 Sellowiana, Pr., is perhaps identical with our Lomaria Spicant, as also another 

 species found in Chili. The one to which he alludes in Chili, is no doubt the 

 L. alpina, of which an excellent figure from the living plant is given at 

 t. 32 of our ' Filices Exotica;.' I think the two are more distinct than many 

 acknowledged species of this variable genus, and that the dififerent nature of the 

 caudex or rhizome, and the form of the pinn<c of the fertile fronds, will alone 

 clearly distinguish them. Of the L. Sellowiana, Pr. (name only, not anywhere 

 described), I possess perfect authentic specimens from Dr. Klotzsch, and they 

 are identical with the Chilian L. alpina, a plant of very extensive distribution 

 in the southern hemisphere, more so than L. Spicant is in the north, yet it 

 does not extend into the trojjics ; and " Brazil" in the present case means 

 South Brazil, probably some part of East Patagonia visited by Sellow ; and it 

 is abundant all round the coast thence along the Straits of Magellan, to Con- 

 ception in Chili, as well as elsewhere. The reported discovery of L. Spicant 

 at the Cape of Good Hope, by a Mr. Riche, needs to be authenticated. May not 

 the specimen that was seen in M. Bory's herbarium really have belonged to 

 L. alpina, which, growing as it does, in the same parallel as the Cape, and east 



