PERNS OP GREAT BRITAIN. 57 



Very beautiful specimens are gathered from the Clova 

 Mountains, where this evergreen plant presents a beau- 

 tiful appearance as it springs out from the rocky crevices ; 

 and it is extensively distributed on the Scottish moun- 

 tains, as well as in the north and west of Ireland. A few 

 rocky hilly places at the north of England are named as 

 its localities, as Falcon Glints, Teesdale ; Mazebeck Scar, 

 Durham ; and LangcliflFe, near Settle ; Giggleswick, and 

 some other places in Yorkshire. It grows on Snowdon, 

 on heights which the traveller hesitates to chmb, thriv- 

 ing even on the loftiest summits of the mountain. It is, 

 however, among the shady clefts of the broken masses 

 of rock, at a less elevation, that this fern attains its 

 greatest luxuriance. In some damp and shady spots 

 among these acclivities it is sometimes a foot and a half 

 high, though in ordinary cases the plants are not more 

 than half a foot in height. The stalk of the frond is 

 very short, and the dark glossy green leafy part is 

 mostly leathery, firm, rigid, and erect, and sufficiently 

 prickly to remind us of the Holly, but it is occasion- 

 ally thinner and less upright in growth. The young 

 fronds appear early in spring, among the yet verdant 

 fronds of the former year. They rise in a tuft from the 

 extremity of a scaly rhizome, and their outline is narrow, 

 linear, and tapering at the upper part. They are pin- 

 nate, with short crowded overlapping twisted pinnae, 

 which are somewhat crescent-shaped; the upper side 

 having at the base an ear-shaped projection, while the 

 lower side has the appearance of having had a piece cut 

 out. The veins are twice or thrice branched, reaching 

 nearly to the margin, without uniting with others. The 



