66 



form, wMch is said to grow at an altitude varying between 8000ft. and 

 10,000ft. on the Sierra of California. As may be seen by comparing our 

 illustrations (Figs, lo and 14), the general appearance of C. cjnsjM acrosti- 

 choides would seem sufficiently distinct to warrant the assumption of its being 

 an independent species. The distinctions are, however, more apparent than 

 real, for Hooker, in " Species Filicum," ii., p. 131, says that some of the 

 Scottish specimens of C. crisixi in his collection are almost identical with 

 those from North America, and that he has some from the United States and 

 from British Columbia which cj[uite agree with the common European form. 

 The two plants are, in fact, so nearly allied that Hooker and Milde have 

 considered the American as only a variety of the European species. 



The Mountain Parsley Fern, so named on account of its great resemblance 

 to the tyj^ical Parsley (and not, as people generally imagine, to the curled 

 forms almost exclusively cultivated nowadays), is undoubtedly one of the 

 prettiest of all our native Ferns. It is also one of the very few which, 

 under cultivation, have retained their characters perfectly constant ; for, 

 notwithstanding the enormous quantities grown under various conditions, no 

 deviation from the species worthy of record has as yet been noticed in this 

 country. It remains, as it was many years ago, simply the Mountain Parsley 

 Fern. The j^lant, which seldom exceeds 5in. to Gin. in height, appears 

 23articularly fond of a cold climate ; and Correvon, in Ms " Fougeres rustiques," 

 p. 83, says that it is the Mountain Fern par excellence, as it is rare that, 

 except in the Polar regions, it is met with in any other situation than on the 

 mountains. In the Haute- Savoie, as also on Mont Blanc and on the Buet, 

 this Fern is so abundant as to form, so to speak, in certain places the basis 

 of the vegetation. It is also found on the Swiss Alps, while in Grermany it 

 is plentiful on the Harz, the Eiesengebirge, and in the Black Forest. In 

 France it occurs on the Yosges, the Cevennes, and the Pyrenees. 



C. crispa appears to have been unknown to G-erarde and to his editor, 

 Johnson, for we cannot find any mention of it as a British plant until 1696, 

 when Ray, in the second edition of his " Synopsis Methodica Stirpium 

 Britannicarum," describes it as having been found in Westmoreland and other 

 places by Mr. James Sutherland, the first Curator of the Edinburgh Botanical 

 Gardens. Ray calls it, as it was named by its first describer, Schwenkfeld, 

 Adiantum album crispum alpinum, or Curled Alpine White Maidenhair ■ and 



