AND MOSSES. 127 
counties, where it is generally intermixed with the Asplenium 
trichomanes ; in Scotland, to her loftier mountains ; those 
especially of the western islands ; in Wales, to the Snowdon 
range, though most profusely in the Assure called Twll Dee, 
and at the base of the fissure where it opens into Cwm 
Idwell ; Cader Idris, Brecon Beacon, the Lady's Waterfall 
by Neath, and rocks within a few miles of thp same place, 
are also acknowledged localities. * 
Few among the brotherhood of ferns are more delicately 
formed than the Green Spleenwort. The root is fibrous, 
black, and somewhat tender ; the rhizoma black, scaly, and 
tufted. In May and June, when the meadows are bright 
with fiowers, and warbling voices resound from every hedge 
and thicket, the fronds lift up their heads ; they attain 
maturity in August, and remain green throughout the 
winter. 
For about a third of its length the rachis is uniformly 
naked ; half this part is black or purple ; the remainder to 
the apex of the frond, and all the pinnae, are of a bright 
emerald hue ; the form of the frond is narrow, elongate, 
linear, and simply pinnate, and though the pinnae are not so 
numerous as in A. trichomanes, they are somewhat quadrate, 
but without angles, and more or less crenate at the margin ; 
they are in general placed alternately on the rachis, are 
usually very distinct and separate, occasionally crowded, 
and attached to the rachis by their stalks only. 
But the most decided specific character belonging to the 
plant is, " that the lateral veins are either simple or forked, 
bearing an elongate linear mass of thecse, almost immediately 
on leaving the mid- veins ; and that, if forked, the division 
takes place beyond the mass of thecse. The veins do not 
reach the margin of the pinna : the theca? are at first covered 
by a linear, elongate indusium, which soon disappears, and 
they become confluent in a ferruginous mass, occupying the 
centre of the pinna, and concealing the mid-vein. The 
masses at first are four or six in number." 
