IX. ASPLENIUM. 105 
l>carance may not be lost sight of. It is propagated by 
dividing the tufts when there is more than one crown. 
The young fronds spring up about April or May. 
6. Asplenium viride, Hudson. Green Spleenwort. 
Fronds linear pinnate ; pinnae rhomboidal or roundish- 
ovate crenated stalked; rachis not winged green in the 
upper part 
ASPLENIUM VIEIDB, Hudson : Sm. Eng. Fl. iv.. 293 : Eng. Hot. 
t. 2-257 : Bab. Man 414: Hook and Arn. Fl. 573: Florigr. Brit.iv. 
71: Newm. 281: Franc. 47. ASPLENIUM TKICHOUANES KAMOSDM, 
Linnaeus. 
/3. acutum : pinnae ' long and pointed ' (Newm.). , 
The Green Spleenwort produces its fronds in a dense 
tuft from the caudex, which is dark coloured, somewhat 
creeping, and furnished with a few narrow pointed scales, 
producing also numerous slender wiry roots, by which it 
tixes itself to its native rocks. The fronds grow up in May, 
remaining green through the winter, and are narrow 
linear, pinnate, light green, and from two to eight or ten 
inches in length, according to the circumstances of ex- 
posure or shelter under which they have grown. They are 
terminal and adherent to the caudex, and, in a young 
state, are covered with fine, very deciduous scales. The 
stipes is smooth, usually about a third of the length of the 
frond, more or less purplish brown at the base, but other- 
wise green, the green colour being continued along the 
rachis to the apex. The pinnae, attached by slender stalks, 
are commonly, but not invariably alternate, and more 
distant in the lower than in the upper part of the frond ; 
they vary considerably in form, between rhomboidal and 
roundish-ovate, usually tapering to the base, but some- 
times broadest at the base, and much shortened and 
rounded at the apex ; the margin is deeply crenated. 
Sometimes the apex of the frond is dichotomously or tri- 
chotoinously forked. The mid-vein of the pinnae is dis- 
