WASHINGTON, AND MARION COUNTIES. 23 



When we sometimes in memory go back to the poor bare- 

 footed boy, who roamed those grand old forests, these beau- 

 tiful plants are still " shakers" even to us. 



A few notes on their distribution over this region will not 

 be uninteresting to the botanists and other lovers of these 

 charming and diversified plants. 



The little scaly polypody is more often seen growing in the 

 mosses on the old sycamore trees, on the banks ol Chaplin 

 and Salt rivers, in Mercer county, than any other localities in 

 this district. It is to be sometimes found on the limestones 

 near the Kentucky river, and also on the highest sandstones 

 of the Knobs in Marion county. 



The maiden- hair fern through the whole district, wherever 

 the conditions of its growth have not been destroyed, may be 

 found clustered in the rich soils where the shades lit; all 

 through the day. It seems to love equally well the deep 

 shadows by the streams, and the secluded shelters in the 

 Knobs. 



The clothed lip fern is very rare, and we only found it on 

 two occasions. It was growing in dense beds on sandstone 

 rocks, tightly wedged in their crevices, at the top of the 

 tallest Knobs which rise above the valley of the Rolling Fork 

 nf Salt river, in the neighborhood of Bradfordsville, Marion 

 county. 



1 he common bracken is found only on the highest hills 

 where the Carboniferous soils allow suitable conditions for 

 its preservation. 



1 he cliff-brake is very hardy, and is to be seen nearly every- 

 where that limestones are exposed enough to give provisions 

 lor its growth. Requiring little soil or moisture, it seems to 

 feed upon the air and the rocks. 



I he pinnatifid spicenTvort was only once seen ; a few plants 

 grew on tin; face of a bluff, composed of Subcarboniferous 

 sandstone, near the boundary line of Larue and Marion coun- 

 ties. 



Of that rare hybrid, the Asplenium ebenoides, we found three 

 plants, growing on a fallen mass of sandstone, near Salt Lick 



