31 
BLECHNUM BOEEALE. Swartz. 
f Common Hard Fern.) 
Derivation of Name. Latinised from hlechmn^ a Greek 
name for a fern. 
SYNONYMIES. 
OsMiJNDA SPICANT. Linncous^ Lightfoot, Hudson. 
Blechnijm SPICANT. Withering^ Newman^ Moore. 
Lomaria SPICANT. Besvaux, Newman. 
description. 
Caudex tufted and kairy, with, black, strong rootlets. 
Fronds of two kinds, barren and fertile. Barren ones 
shortest, pinatifid with oblong pinn£e. Fertile frond pinnate 
with linear pinnae. They spring about May, and the 
barren ones are sometimes found green throughout the 
vdnter, but the fertile ones wither at the end of autumn. 
Veins forked, the branches forming a continuous line 
about midway between the midvein and margin .of the 
pinnae, all along the side of this continuous vein are attached 
the 
Spore Cases covered by a linear white involucre. 
This fern is very liable to variation, and such is the 
present rage for establishing varieties of it that it would be 
