LASTED A CKISTATA. 143 
The spores are at first black, but they become rusty 
as they ripen. 
In very luxuriant specimens, and in specimens grow- 
ing in very shaded situations, this Fern attains a height 
of even three feet, and the leaflets are wider apart. 
This is one of our rarest Ferns. It has been found on 
boggy heaths, among coarse grass, at the Lows, on Holt 
Heath ; at Fritton, near Yarmouth, in Suffolk, and Sur- 
lingham Road, near Norwich, in Norfolk ; among Alder 
bushes, at Westleton, and at Bexley, near Ipswich, in 
Suffolk ; on Oxton Bogs, in Nottinghamshire ; in 
Huntingdonshire ; near Madeley, in Staffordshire ; and 
o Wybunbury Bog, in Cheshire. In Ireland it has 
been discovered on the estate of Lord Gough, at Rathro- 
nan, near Clonmel. 
We believe this to be Dr. Johnson's Filix mas ramosa 
pinnulis dentatis. He says, it then (1633) grew " plen- 
tifully in the boggy, shadowy moors near Durnford 
Abbey, in Sussex, and also on the moist, shadowy 
rocks by Maple-durham, near Petersfield, in Hampshire ; 
and I have found it often on the dead, putrefied bodies 
and stems of old, rotten Oaks, in the moors. Near the 
old plants I have observed very many small, young 
plants growing, which came by the falling of the seed 
from their dusty scales ; for I believe all herbs have 
seeds in themselves to produce their kinds. Gen. i. 11 
and 12." (Gerarde's Herbal, ed. by Johnson, 1129.) Ray, 
in his Historia Plantarum, also says, that Mr. Goodyer 
had found it not only in Sussex, but in many other 
places in England. 
