80 PERNS OP GREAT BRITAIN. 



shaking out all tlie loose earth, I found it a very incon- 

 venient load to carry, even the single mile which I had 

 to convey it. This tuft, consisting, I suppose, but of one 

 rhizoma, had upwards of three hundred perfectly vigo- 

 rous fronds, besides at least an equal number of decay- 

 ing ones, the relics of the previous year." The fronds 

 are usually two, three or four inches in length, slender 

 and forked, so as to resemble the horns of a stag ; easily 

 distinguished by their shape from any other fern, re- 

 minding one of the leaves of that common plant, the 

 Buck's-horn Plantain {Plantdffo coronopus). The veins 

 are few and httle branched, one running into each lobe. 

 The clusters of capsules lie in lines, in a very crowded 

 manner, on each side of the vein. They are, at first, 

 covered by a linear-shaped indusium, which bursts open 

 as the capsules mature, and then gradually disappears. 

 The whole under-surface of the frond is finally covered 

 with the brown mass of fructification. 



This fern has by various writers been called Scolop'en- 

 drium septentriondle, Amesium septentriondle, or Acrdsti- 

 cJium septentriondle. The beautiful Elk's-horn Pern, of 

 which we read so much in the works of travellers in Aus- 

 tralia, is the Acrdstichum alcicorne. This Stag's-horn Pern 

 grows on the timber-trees of the forest to a great size, 

 resembling in its shape the palmated antlers of the moose 

 and rein- deer. Mr. Backhouse describes it as sometimes 

 growing on decomposing sandstone rocks, forming pro- 

 tuberant girdles around trees, from which hang the most 

 beautiful flowers of convolvuli. 



7. A. marinum (Sea Spleenwort).— i^roM^fe pinnate ; 

 pinna oblong and blunt, stalked, unequal and wedge- 



