40 
HAEDY FEENS. 
year after year luxuriantly and well, but they do 
not increase. 
Asijlenium germanicum is said to grow on the 
Stenton Eock, as well as the Septentrionale : a 
plant of it was shown to me ; the tiny forked fronds 
were about 1;^ inch in size, and not so broad as 
Septentrionale, the forked ends being almost as 
fine as a thread. I have never possessed this 
Fern, nor have I ever seen a healthy specimen of 
it, or one I should know as perfectly distinct from 
Septentrionale ; indeed, I believe the plants shown 
to me as germanicum have only been diminutive 
specimens of Septentrionale. 
From the Stenton Eock in the cold north my 
mind wanders to the sunny south, where, under 
conditions somewhat similar, and yet how widely 
different, I have seen at Bagneres de Luchon in 
the Hautes Pj-renees, the entire face of a rock, in 
the very eye of the sun, entirely covered with Sep- 
tentrionale : the fronds were nearly double the 
size of our EngHsh Fern, and the forked ends one 
mass of rich brown spores. 
