GYMNOGRAMMA LEPTOPHYLLA. 13 



European botanists, and also to botanists in this country, since 

 I introduced it into the 'Phytologist:' I should otherwise pro- 

 pose to establish a new genus for this and some alKed species, 

 under the name of Dicranodium ; believing that the form now 

 under consideration cannot be naturally associated with the 

 species which Swartz and Desvaux have severally selected as 

 the types of their genera. 



This species has no mention in the works of Withering, 

 Smith, Sowerby, Francis, Hooker and Arnott or Babington. 



This fern occurs in various and distant but mostly maritime 

 European localities. Sadler gives Germany, France, Italy and 

 Spain, as its European countries ; Link gives Naples, Sicily, 

 and the Morea ; Woods enumerates Brittany, Provence, and 

 Italy; Schkuhr, Weber andMohr, and Bory de St. Vincent give 

 Switzerland. I am indebted to my late lamented friend. Col. 

 Bory de St. Vincent, for the beautiful specimen figured in illus- 

 tration of the species at page 11, (fig. a); it was collected by 

 himself on the Alps : and my friend Mr. AUcard, or some of his 

 travelling companions, met with it in several localities both on 

 the Swiss and French Alps : nevertheless, Godet omits it from 

 his 'Flore du Jura.' In Mr. Ward's rich herbarium are exam- 

 ples from Geusans, from Castel Gondolfo, Lake of Albano, from 

 Virgil's tomb, near the grotto of Posilippo, and from Naples, 

 near the Hermitage, all collected by Mr. E. W. Cooke. I have 

 seen many specimens from the Canaries and Azores. Bory de 

 St. Vincent found it in Algeria ; and Schimper distributed it 

 with his Abyssinian plants, bearing this printed label : — "Ad 

 ripas elatas, locis humidis et umbrosis prope Adoam. d. 19 Sept. 

 1837." In the New World, it is recorded by Kunze as having 

 been found in Mexico. 



It has long been spoken of as a British fern, and its occur- 

 rence in the British dominions is now estabhshed beyond a 

 doubt : but its only ascertained locality is the Island of Jersey, 

 and it is merely in compliance with the universal custom of 

 English botanists, that I include the Channel Islands in a his- 

 tory of British Ferns ; for nothing can be more obvious than 



