OCXOBKR ‘W. 
COUNTRY GENTLEMAN'S COMPANION. 
WEEKLY CALENDAR. 
(;■) 
D 
51 
D 
\V 
^ OCT. 30.—NOV. 5, J855. 
1 
Weather near London in 18.53. I 
- ...— - -I, . I Sun 
Barometer. Thermo. “ Rises. 
Sun 
Sets. 
5Ioon 
K. & S. 
kloon’s 
Age. 
Clock 
af. Sun. 
Day rf 
Year. 
30 
To 
Woodcock arrives. 
30.172—30.061 
65 — 36 
S.W. — 51 a 6 
36 a 4 
7 56 
19 
16 
12 
303 
31 
\V 
Wild Duck arrives. 
30.159—30.035 
67—33 
S.W. 01 53 
35 
9 3 
20 
16 
15 
304 
I 
Th 
All Saints. 
30.361—30.352 
61—32 
S.W. — ' 55 
33 
10 al6 
c 
16 
17 
305 
2 
F 
November 5Ioth. 
30.424 — 30.161 
59—39 
S.E. ; _ , 
31 
11 29 
22 
Id 
18 
306 
3 
8 
Winter 5Ioth. 
30.265—30.215 
52—25 
N. — 58 
29 
morn. 
23 
16 
18 
307 
4 
Son 
22 Sunday after Trinity. 
30.197—29.992 
58—49 
W. , — VII 
27 
0 41 
24 
16 
IS . 
303 
5 
51 
Gunpowder Plot, 1605. 
30 . 144 — 29.982 
57-29 
N.W. — 1 2 
25 
1 51 
25 
16 
17 
309 
Meteorolocy of the Week. —At Chiswick, from observations during the last twenty-eight years, the average highest and lowest tem¬ 
peratures of these days are 53.5°, and 38.6“, respectively. The greatest heat, 68 ’, occurred on the 3rd, in 1852; and the lowest cold, 20°, 
on the 3rd, in ;645. During the period 97 days were fine, and on 99 rain fell. 
ASPLE'NIUM TRICHO'MANES. 
Tins is the Common Maidenhair Splcenivort,Com¬ 
mon Wall Spleenwort, Enylish Maidenhair, and 
English Blach Maidenhair of our native herbalists. 
The main body of tbo root is short, thick, dark 
purplish-chesnut, tufted, and furnished with many 
wiry rootlets of the same colour. From the tuft 
of the root arise many evergreen fronds, usually 
erect, but often spreading. They vary in length 
from two to twelve inches, and arc simply a stalk 
clothed from the very bottom to the top with 
leafits. The stalk is smooth, very stiff, purplish- 
brown, and channelled in front. The leafits are 
very dark green, numerous, nearly stalkless, more 
or less alternate, about a quarter-of-an-inch long, 
gradually diminishing in size towards the top 
and bottom of the frond, oval but blunt at tbe 
upper end, and partially and irregularly scolloped 
at the upper edge. Fructif cation in six or 
eight masses, oblong, parallel to each other, but 
attached to the lateral veins passing obliquely 
from the mid-vein. The lateral veins divide into 
two, and sometimes three branches; the upper 
branch bearing the fructification. The membrane, 
or indusium, which covers the fructification, is 
whitish, and it separates with a wavy edge from 
the oblique vein to which it was attached, and 
then exposes the capsules of sori, which are dark 
buff, or brown, and soon run together, or, as it is 
technically termed, become confluent. 
There are three varied forms of thisFeru. One, 
called incisum (cut), has the edges of each leafit deeply 
I and irregularly cut, so as to resemble the leaf of some 
I of the Cratseguses. Another form has the leafits so 
I crowded together, that they overlap each other like the 
j tiles of a house-roof; and in the third form, sometimes 
; called monstrosum (deformed), the end of the frond is 
I branched, or forked. This last variety was found by 
Mr. D. Dick, at St. Mary’s Isle, Kircudbright, and by 
Mr. J. R. Kinahan, at Quin Abbey, Clare. 
Tliis Fern is found in all parts of the British Islands, 
on the shady sides of rocks, old walls, and iiedge-banks. 
In the situation last named it attains tbe greatest 
height. It is not confined, however, to our country, nor 
even to Europe, for it is found in various parts of Asia, 
Jamaica, and North America. 
It was known as one of our native plants to the 
earliest of our herbalists, for in “ The secoude parte of 
William Turner’s herball,” published in 1508, ho calls 
it '^English Maydens heare',' and the woodcut loaves no 
doubt that it was our Asplenium trichomanes. He says 
—“the juice stayeth the heare that falleth of, and,if 
they be fallen off, it restoreth them agayne.” Many 
other of our old medical writers speak of this Fern as 
that from which Capillaire is made, and there is little 
doubt but that it would impart as much virtue to that 
compound as does the Adiantum capillus veneris, or True 
Maidenhair, of which it ought to be made. It bas, 
however, still some local reputation, the Highland 
dames of Scotland often forming from it a tea which 
they administer to those who are afflicted with coughs 
or colds. 
Gerarde is the first writer who mentions any place in 
England where it was native. He says—“ 1 found it 
growing in a shadowy, sandy lane in Betsome, in the 
No. CCCIJCX. Vor. XV. 
