THE MOUNTAIN POLYPODY. 15 
This Fern is scattered nearly throughout Europe, extending from 
Iceland and the Scandinavian countries southwards through the 
British Isles and continental Europe—France, Belgium, Holland, 
Switzerland, Germany, Hungary, Croatia, and Transylvania, to 
Spain, Northern Italy, and Greece. In Asia it is recorded from 
Unalaschka and Kamtchatka, and also as extending along the 
chain of the Altai. Algeria, in Africa, is said to produce it; whilst 
in America, where it is sometimes known under the name of 
P. connectile, it is met with from Greenland and Labrador on the 
eastern side, to Prince William’s Sound on the western, extending 
southwards to the Rocky Mountains, to Canada, and to the northern 
United States. 
In cultivation the Mountain Polypody requires a free supply of. 
water; and at the same time, in order that this supply may not 
stagnate about its roots, very perfect drainage should be provided. 
This is best done by using broad shallow pots, and filling up about 
two-thirds of their depth with coarse rubbly materials, to allow of 
the percolation of the water, which, moreover, should not be too 
continuously kept in feeders about the bottoms of the pots. Turfy 
peat mixed with leaf-mould in the proportions of two-thirds of the 
former to one-third of the latter, and the whole well blended with 
sand, forms a good compost. The plants are hardy enough to endure 
cold, but the beauty of the fronds, except in very favourable situa- 
tions, can only be secured by keeping them, at least during the 
` growing season, in some place of shelter, of which none can be more 
congenial to the plants than a cold shady frame, or its equivalent. 
The same remarks apply to Polypodium Dryopteris. 
The Mountain Polypody is not liable to much variation. The 
only abnormal form which has been observed has some of the 
pinne or pinnules bifid or multifid, and occasionally the apex of the 
frond is similarly divided. It also generally happens that where 
dichotomous division takes place, the approximate portions are at 
‘the same time depauperated. Depauperation, caused by the punc- 
tures of an insect at an early stage of development, sometimes 
occurs, and might be mistaken for a natural variation. 


