246 
ASPLENIA^CEiE. 
jagged. * ^ Scarcely one fourth so large as the pre- 
ceding, of which nevertheless some good botanists have thought 
it a variety, and indeed, after long cultivation, though raised ori- 
ginally from seed, it considerably approaches that species. In 
a wild state the fronds are of a more narrow lanceolate figure, 
and of a paler pellucid green, the main stalk occasionally scaly, 
but in general quite smooth and exactly quadrangular, though 
the latter circumstance varies. Leaflets shorter and somewhat 
less linear than in Filix-femincij deeply serrated or partly pin- 
natifid, their segments sharply cut without bristly points. Mass- 
es by the side of the midrib of a few of the lowermost lobes of 
each leaflet, solitary, oblong, though short and ultimately round- 
ish or oval. Cover at first oblong, soon becoming kidney-shaped 
or almost orbicular with a lateral notch, flat, thin, membranous 
and jagged. Capsules dark brown.” ^ Mr. Cameron, of the 
Botanic Garden at Birmingham, has observed that this plant in 
cultivation becomes the convex form of Filix-femina \ and my 
own experiments confirm his observations. 
The late Mr. David Don, in a paper published in the ^Trans- 
actions of the Linnean Society of London,’ and which I have 
previously had occasion to quote, writes thus on the forms of Fi- 
lix-femina, ‘‘There are two very marked varieties of this plant; 
the one with broader segments, of a dark green, with the stipes 
and rachis of a pale purple hue ; the other, and that the com- 
monest, with the segments of a more delicate texture, and the 
whole frond of a pale green. The latter variety varies much. in 
size, according to soil and situation ; in damp shady places it 
becomes the Filix-foemina of ‘ English Botany,’ and in more 
open exposed situations, the irrigumn ; but neither of these 
states is entitled to be regarded as a distinct form. A specimen 
of the larger variety in the Linnaean herbarium, is marked Foly- 
podium rlixticum^ and with the usual mark of authenticity at- 
tached to the specimen.” f The first of these forms is the var. 
incisiim, the second the var. convexum, of the foregoing list. 
‘The Naturalists’ Almanack’ adopts, with a mark expressive 
of uncertainty, three of Roth’s species, — molle^ Filix-femina^ 
■*Eng\ Flor. iv. 283. f Trans. Linn. Soc.-xvii. 436. 
