186 THE BRITISH FERNS. 
state they are reddish-white. When fresh, iodine colours them 
bluish-black, indicating the presence of starch, particles of which 
substance may be recognised by the microscope. The dried ‘ root’ 
has a feeble earthy somewhat disagreeable odour. Its taste is at 
first sweetish, then bitter, astringent, and subsequently nauseous 
like rancid fat. The caudices should be collected in the height of 
summer, but both in the whole state and powdered they deteriorate 
by keeping. Large doses of it would appear to excite nausea and 
vomiting. The anthelmintic property of the drug resides in the 
oil, which forms but a small proportion of the bulk, as will be seen 
by the following analysis by Geiger,* quoted by Dr. Pereira :一 
Ligneous fibre and starch . : £ à o . 568 
Inerystallisable sugar | 22.9 
Oxidisable tannin d i : : E 
Gum and salts, with sugar and tannin . : 3 | OR 
Green fat oil . 4 : : a 3 : d (OED) 
Green resin . a : ! > 2 ; : . 41—100°0. 
According to another analysis of Morin, f quoted in the same 
work, the constituents of the Fern stems are:-—volatile oil; fixed 
oil (stearin and olein); tannin; gallic and acetic acids; incrystallis- 
able sugar; starch; gelatinous matter insoluble in water and 
alcohol ; ligneous fibre; and ashes, consisting of carbonate sulphate 
and hydrochlorate of potash, carbonate .and phosphate of lime, 
alumina, silica, and oxide of iron. 
The Male Fern is also applied to various economic uses, such as 
the bleaching of linen, the manufacture of glass, and the tanning 
of leather. The Bracken and the Male Fern were in Lightfoot’s 
time burnt together for the sake of their ashes, which were used by 
the soap and glass makers; and he mentions that in the Island of 
Jura, 150/. worth of these ashes was exported annually. The astrin- 
gent stems are used in dressing leather, and the ashes in bleaching 
linen. Bishop Gunner relates, that the young curled fronds on their 
first appearance out of the ground are boiled and eaten like aspa- 
ragus, and that the poorer Norwegians cut off the succulent lamine 
* Geiger, Handb. de Pharm. 1829. 
+ Morin, Journ. de Pharm. x. 223. 
X Flora Norvegica. 

