96 



A TERN BOOK rOU EVERYBODY. 



This is a southern species, being found only in the 

 warmer parts of the British Isles. It will not succeed in 

 the open air, but will thrive in a greenhouse or Wardian 

 case. In a heated fernery it will flourish luxuriantly and 

 produce plenty of young plants. 



E/ay, on the authority of a Montpellier physician, at- 

 tributes every possible virtue to this fern, notwithstanding 

 which its use is quite obsolete in medical practice. It is 

 slightly astringent, and is said to have entered into the 

 composition of the beverage called " capillaire," though 

 it is doubtful whether now-a-days any portion of the 

 Maidenhair Fern enters into its composition. 



It was stated at a meeting of the Natural History So- 

 ciety of Dublin that this plant grows abundantly in the 

 limestone districts of Burren, in the county of Clare, and 

 m the Arran Islands, Glalway Bay, and that it has been 

 found on clay-slate in the county of Leitrim, and on old 

 red sandstone, Cahir Conree Mountain, Kerry ; thus ac- 

 commodating itself to various geological formations. The 

 plants of Burren seem peculiar to that district, and are 

 said to be identical with the Adiantum Africanum, de- 

 scribed by Eobert Brown as found in the island of Q-oletta, 

 in the Mediterranean, and on the African coast. They 

 diff'er materially in growth from those of the South Europe 

 and specimens from Cornwall. 



BLADDER mBNS. 



Clusters of spore-cases with a covering resembling a hood. 



The name by which this genus of ferns is known to 

 botanists is Cystopteris, which being translated into plain 

 English, simply means " Bladder Eerns." Why they are 

 so designated seems to have originated in the form of Ijie 

 covering to the clusters of spore-cases. This covering is 

 attached beneath the tufts and expands over them like a 

 hood, a feature which distinguishes these from all other 

 of our native ferns. In external appearance they may 

 easily be confounded with ferns belonging to other groups 



