22 
FERNS. 
[ Poly podium. 
prominent, and arranged in straight lines equally distant from the 
margin and the midrib of the lobe ; each sorus terminating one of 
the branches of a transverse vein. The plant is perennial and the 
fruit found throughout the summer. 
fi. (V. cambricum, Linn.) Frond ovate ; pinnule ovate, and deeply cleft. 
y. ( sinuatum .) Frond ovate, or triangular ; pinnules proliferous. 
S. (serratum.) Pinnules distinctly and often doubly serrated, 
f. (acuium.) Pinnules pointed ; fronds long ; both narrow. 
9. ( bifidum .) Pinnules cleft at the point. 
Mr. Mackay remarks, in his “ Flora Hibernica,” that the Irish plant is some- 
what different from the Polyp. Cambricum of Linnaeus. It is in fact our variety 
y, which is the same as the Pol. Virginianum of Pursh, and intermediate 
between the usual state of the plant and the Cambricum ; it bears fruit copiously, 
whereas the real Cambricum is usually without fruit, both in its wild and cul- 
tivated state. We might expect this, indeed, from the feather-like appearance 
of the plant, and the dilation of its lobes, a too great expansion of leaf being 
here as elsewhere detrimental to the production of fruit. The foregoing observa- 
tion was made in distinct reference to a frond, of which C in the annexed cut is 
an exact representation ; but a plant still more nearly approaching Linnaeus’s 
Pol. Cambricum is in Sir J. Smith’s herbarium, marked as from Ireland. A 
pinnule is represented in the Fig. D, copied from the original specimen, an ad- 
mirable figure of the whole frond, as well as of the Cambricum is in “ Newman’s 
Ferns,” p. 22. One pinnule of the latter is represented at B, and a whole frond 
of it, from my herbarium, at A. The other varieties are shown at E F and G. 
Vir. — A lthough still retained in the pharmacopoeias, it is scarcely, if at all, 
used in medicine at the present day. It is feebly astringent, of a bitter and 
nauseous taste, and has been considered efficacious in catarrhal disorders, and 
against worms, in doses of from one to two drams of the dried root. 
Haij. — T he common states of the plant (re and £,) are generally distributed 
over the United Kingdom, on trees, walls, banks, and rocks. — / 3 . On the rocks 
in some parts of North Wales, but without fruit. — Braid Hall, near Edinburgh, 
Mr. Brown. At Chepstow, Monm., Sir J. E. Smith. — y. Woods at Dulwich 
(1835), Mr. Saunders and Mr. W. Pamplin. South Isles of Arran (1806), 
Mr. Mackay. In the Dargle, county of Wicklow, Miss Fitton. Innisfollen 
Island, Killarney, Mr. Kelly . — South side of King’s Park, Edinburgh, Mr. Brown, 
t . Rocks in North Wales, With. Meadows near Maldon, and other meadows 
near Ewell, Surrey, Mr. J. Bevis. Cobham Park, Kent. — G.F. 
Geo. — Found in most of the middle parts of Europe and North America. 
