Eurofean Ferns. 
i 1 6 
( cuneatum ) of the Wall Rue which indeed somewhat approaches this, but it is a stouter plant, 
and of thicker texture, while the teeth, where they exist, are very different. 
ASPLENIUM FISSUM, Kit. 
This is a very distinct fern, which is confined to the European continent. It has a 
small woody creeping caudex, covered with black scales, from which rise the tufted fronds. 
The stipes is slender, dark- 
brown and shining below, and 
green above ; the fronds are 
from two to five inches in 
length, and about half as broad, 
oblong triangular in outline ; 
they are three or four times 
pinnate, with spreading deep- 
ly pinnatifid pinnules, the ulti- 
mate segments of which are 
extremely narrow. The sori, 
although small, occupy when 
mature almost the entire of 
the under-surface of the frond ; 
they are oblong, and of a 
reddish-brown colour. The ex- 
treme fineness of the divisions 
of the frond is sufficient to 
distinguish this from any other 
Asplenium. 
This is a rare and local 
plant, occurring in alpine chalky 
situations at an elevation of from 
four to five thousand feet. Its 
most northern locality is the Island of Gothland ; it occurs in several places in the Tyrol, and 
in Southern Germany, Dalmatia, Styria, Italy, Austria, Hungary, and Turkey. 
Milde considers as distinct from this a plant which in the “Synopsis Filicum ” is treated 
as a variety of it. This is A. lepidum , Presl, which is said to differ from A. fissum in the 
fimbriated (not crenate) indusium, and glandular (not dark-brown and smooth) stipes. This 
is a native of Sicily ; it was said by Presl, its original describer, to have been collected in 
Bohemia, but some error may be suspected in this statement. In deference to Milde we 
have given this a separate place in our table;* but it seems scarcely entitled to specific rank. 
ASPLENIUM LEPIDUM. 
* Introduction, p. 16. 
