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COMMON ADDER’S TONGUE. 
There are two British species of Ojphioglossum — 
the Common Adder’s Tongue — 0. vulgatum , and the 
Dwarf — O. Lusitanicum , the last only recently found 
in Guernsey. The Common Adder’s Tongue is 
widely dispersed, and abundant where it occurs. 
The only locality given for it in the Lake Country is 
in the meadows by St. Bees. It is scattered over the 
whole of Europe and Asia, North America, and 
Mexico, and found in some of its varieties at the 
Cape of Good Hope, in New Zealand, and Australia. 
The Common Adder’s Tongue is small and stemless, 
the stem only represented by the central crown of its 
few coarse brittle roots. The young fronds, from six 
to twelve inches high, are produced in May and perish 
by the end of the summer. The stipes is variable in 
length, smooth, round, hollow, and succulent. The 
upper part is divided into branches — one branch 
leafy, entire, smooth, obtusely egg-shaped and slightly 
variable in form, traversed by irregular-angled veins, 
forming elongated meshes within which are smaller 
veinlets, — the other branch erect, contracted for 
about half its length, forming a linear slightly tapering 
spike, in the substance of which, upon each of its 
two opposite sides, a line of crowded spore- cases is 
imbedded. The spore-cases are therefore considered 
to be produced on the margin of a contracted frond. 
When ripe, the margin splits at intervals correspond- 
ing with the centre of each spore-case, so that the 
spike then resembles a double row of gaping spherical 
cavities. 
The leaves, pounded in a mortar, are said to yield 
