17R RIGID FERN. 



This species is an inhabitant of Hungary, Germany, France, 

 Italy, Russia and Siberia ; but I am not aware of its having 

 been found in Africa or America. 



It seems confined to limestone rocks in mountainous dis- 

 tricts, and has hitherto, so far as regards Great Britain, only 

 been found in three (? four) English and one Irish county. 



Westmoeeland. — Mr. Simpson informs me he found it " in great pro- 

 fusion growing out of broken limestone, on the declivity of a hill just by the 

 border of Lancashire : " he observes, " I never saw any fern in such masses, 

 several hundred fronds beiag together in a compact bundle, so much so, in- 

 deed, that when I had pulled two himdred, no diminution of the quantity 

 was observable." Miss Beever, in a letter of subsequent date, says that it 

 grows " most profusely on and near Amside Knot." Mr. Finder, at a still 

 later period, writes thus : — "I met with Lastrea rigida in great profusion 

 along the whole of the great scar limestone district, at intervals between 

 Amside Knot, where it is comparatively scarce, and Ingleborough, being 

 most abundant on Hutton Roof crags and Farlton Knot, where it grows in 

 the deep fissures of the natural platform, and occasionally high in the cleft 

 of the rocks : it is generally much shattered by the winds, or cropped by the 

 sheep, which seem to be fond of it. With regard to the shape of the frond, 

 I may mention that among some hundreds of specimens I found but one 

 or two which agreed with your figure [see the right hand, then the only 

 figure, on page 175] drawn from an Ingleborough specimen, all mine be- 

 ing more or less triangular [see the left hand figm-e], and not having the 

 lower pair of pinnse shorter than those in the upper and middle part of the 

 frond : the fronds of young plants are remarkably triangular. The two 

 forms of frond no doubt depend upon the situation, whether sheltered or 

 otherwise, and on other causes ; still I imagine the triangular to be the true 

 form of the plant, having been informed by a person resident in the neigh- 

 bourhood, that the plant from Ingleborough assumes the triangular form 

 in cultivation. I do not know whether it has been recorded that this fern 

 possesses a slight scent, not at all unpleasant, but strikingly different from 

 that of other ferns." 



YoEKSHiHE. — The Eev. Mr. Bree first recorded this fern as British : he 

 found it growing on Ingleborough, on the north-west side, near the foot of 

 the mountain ; and it has been found in the same locality by the Rev. Mr. 

 Finder. Mr. Tatham informs me that " it grows abundantly in the fis- 

 sures of limestone rocks, at an elevation of 1560 feet above the level of the 



