6 HANDY BOOK OF 
singular property of penetrating mortar ; thus admirably is 
even the humblest plant adapted to the site which it is de- 
signed to occupy. The green leaves or fronds appear in 
May and June, and attain perfection in August ; they con- 
tinue uninjured by frosts or rains, and are uniformly 
fertile. 
This small fern is easily distinguished, even when growing 
among such as arc deteriorated by ungenial soil, or ex- 
posure on walls and rocks. The rhizoma is tufted, brown, 
and scaly, and a small portion of the rachis alone is naked, 
beset more or less thickly with pointed, chaffy scales. 
" The frond is linear, elongate, and pinnate, or pinnatifid ; 
the pinnae are attached to the rachis by their entire base, 
and are sometimes also connected with each other ; they are 
obtuse, rounded, and crenate ; the entire under-surface of 
the frond is covered with brown, pointed scales, thought by 
some botanists to be analogous to the indusium of other 
ferns." 
" The side veins are few in number, alternate and irre- 
gularly branched ; they terminate before the margin of the 
pinna, and are united at their extremities, dividing the 
pinna into numerous compartments. The anterior branch 
of each lateral vein bears an elongate mass of theca), fixed 
apparently to the back of the vein, and seeming as if forced 
aside by the surrounding scales." Occasionally they are 
attached to a lateral vein, which in each pinna runs parallel 
with the rachis. 
Four names have been given to the Scaly-hart's-tonguo 
by different authors. Hooker, Mackay, and Francis call it 
Grammitis celcrach ; Linmeus, Withering. Hudson, Light- 
foot, Bolton, Bcrkcnhout, Asplcnium celcrach ; Smith and 
G alpine, Scolopcndrium cetemceh ; Willdenow, Celcrach 
officinale. Such are the various appellations by which this 
pleasing little fern is known to botanists ; but however fre- 
quent on inland rocks, and old walls cemented by mortar 
mixed with clay, we are informed that it is becoming very 
