THE SPLEEN WORTS. 
5 . 
THE LANCEOLATE SPLEENWORT. 
Asp leniuni lanceolatum, 
Plate 7 , Fig. 5 . 
HERE is so much similarity between the 
Lanceolate and the Black Maidenhair 
jJi Spleenwort, that Fern-hunters are in 
danger oftentimes of mistaking the one for the 
other. But there is one mark by which the two 
Ferns can be unmistakably distinguished from 
each other. In the Black Maidenhair the frond is 
broadest at its base, and tapers upwards gradually 
to its point; it is, in fact, distinctly triangular. In 
Lanceolatum, on the contrary, the frond is 
broadest about the centre of its leafy part ; and 
from thence it tapers in both directions to its tip 
and to its base. In other respects the description 
of the fronds of Adiantum nigrum will very nearly 
apply to those of Lanceolatum, with this general 
difference, that the widest branches of the 
fronds of Lanceolatum are not so broad and not 
377 
