TRUE MAIDENHAIR. 



The geographical range of this species is very wide, extend- 

 ing over the middle and south of Europe, the islands of the 

 Mediterranean, the north of Africa, the Canary and Cape de 

 Verd Islands ; and forms so similar as scarcely to admit a doubt 

 of their identity, occur in nearly every tropical or temperate 

 country yet visited by botanists. Sir William Hooker, in his 

 ' Species Filicum' (ii. 36), gives the following Asiatic, Oceanic, 

 and American localities : — " Throughout the East Indies, but 

 chiefly in damp hilly districts, Malabar, Nepal, Kamaoun, &c. 

 Assam, Khasya, Boutan, Scinde. Mauritius, Bourbon, Mada- 

 gascar. China. South Africa, Algoa Bay, Uitenhage. Sandwich 

 Islands. Throughout the temperate parts of North America, 

 East and West side. Guatemala. Mexico. Trinidad. Do- 

 minica. Jamaica." In Britain, it is one of our most local 

 and most beautiful ferns : it always occurs in moist caves, or 

 in the fissures of rocks, near the sea-coast, preferring a per- 

 pendicular surface, whence its delicate fronds grow in a nearly 

 horizontal direction, inclining upwards at the extremity. It 

 seems particularly to delight in localities where water trickles 

 down the surface of the rock. 



Cornwall. — I am indebted to Miss J. M. Fox for a living plant from 

 Carclew, the seat of Sir 0. Lemon, where it grows abundantly. Mr. Ealfs 

 informs me he found it on cliffs within reach of the sea-spray, between St. 

 Ives and Hayle ; and Mr. H. 0. Watson gives me St. Tves as a habitat, 

 on the authority of the Rev. J. S. Tozer, and Carrick Gladden, a sea-cave 

 in the same vicinity, on the authority of the Eev. Jas. Harris. I have 

 many other authorities for each of these stations. 



Devonshibb. — I am indebted to Mr. Ward for specimens from the 

 vicinity of Ilfracombe : he found it growing liixm-iantly on the face and in 

 the vertical crevice of a rook in White Pebble Bay, in a dense mass, which 

 commences at a height of about twenty-five feet, and descends to witbiu 

 about five feet of the level of the sea ; he also observed it at Pdllidge Point, 

 and two other stations in the same neighbourhood. Mr. Edwin Lees has 

 obligingly sent me specimens from the same localities : he found it in grea,t 

 abundance in September, 1843 : in every instance the fern was growing in 

 gulleys of the cliff, where little rills of fresh water dribble down from above, 

 depositing a travertine sediment. Mr, .J. Buokman, of Cheltenham, has 



