48 



THE FERN BULLETIN 



does the fate of specific names often depend — but a 

 club-moss by any other name would smell as distinct, 

 so what's the use ? As to who it was that first called it 

 L. alopecuroides f. adprcssum, history such as we have 

 at hand is silent. Possibly it was the present writer. 

 It does not matter. The specimen illustrated was col- 

 lected near Sanford, Florida by Severin Rapp. 

 —W. N. C. 



THE DWARF SPLEENWORT. 



Asplenium pumilum. 



By Willard N. Clute. 



Those who have confined their fern studies to a 

 limited region often have an erroneous concep- 

 tion of the range in form of genera that makes collect- 

 ing in any distant country a series of surprises. Some- 

 times the impression of a genus is correct, as when we 

 assume from experience with the cinnamon fern, the 

 interrupted fern, and the royal fern, that all the Os- 

 mund as are large, but we are as likely to go astray in 

 our judgment as we do when we infer from a few dim- 

 inutive specimens that all the filmy ferns are as small 

 and delicate. In general the smaller the genus, the 

 greater is the likelihood that the species composing it 

 are all quite similar ; indeed one of the reasons brought 

 forward for separating our common boulder fern 

 (Dicksonia pilosiuscula) from the other Dicksonias 

 was that it differed from the others so much in size and 

 habit. 



In any large genus, however, it is usual to find a 

 wide range in the size, shape and cutting of the fronds. 

 The species are likely to begin with entire fronds, 

 shade into pinnatifid or pinnate species and end with 



