

BRITISH FERNS 
BLECHNUM SPICANT (THE Harp Fern) (Plate XII). 
This evergreen species is the only one representing in this country 
a very extensive genus which, though closely allied and very similar 
in appearance to the genus Lomaria, is so definitely differentiated 
from it in the particular feature upon which botanists most depend 
for generic determination, i.e. the form of fructification, that we 
cannot possibly class it therewith. Both produce two forms of 
fronds, one barren and one fertile, the 
latter growing erect and being very much 
narrowed in their divisions, these practi- 
cally bearing merely modified pinnz, only 
sufficiently wide to carry the two lines of 
spore capsules, while the barren ones are 
leafy and more or less decumbent or 
drooping. In Lomaria, however, the very 
edges of the modified pinna serve as pro- 
tection to the spore capsules by turning 
backwards and in the young stage covering ' 
them. In B/echnum, however, this is not the case, the lines of 
capsules lie well within the margin, which is not reflexed to protect 
them, as there is an independent indusium or cover for that 
purpose. In one variety, B. anomalum, not very infrequently 
found, this difference is accentuated since all the fronds are wide 
and leafy, but in some the fructification is formed near the midrib, 
with a wide, 1еаїу space between it and the pinna margin which 
could not obviously occur оп Lomaria lines. 
We have taken some pains to make this difference clear, because, 
curiously enough, some botanists of the highest standing name our 
native Blechnum “ Lomaria,” and the latter name still obtains at 
Kew on that account. Britten, in his European Ferns, gives clear 
illustrations of the difference, and the late Dr. Masters, to whom 
we submitted specimens in conjunction with a protest against an 
obvious misnomer, fully justified our contention, as indeed must 
every one who will ascertain the difference as accepted by the 
selfsame botanists, and then examine the plants themselves. The 
fronds of Blechnum spicant are deep green, very tough and leathery, 
whence the name of Hard Fern, and has only once-divided fronds 
in its normal state, vide Fig. 115 and other illustrations for this and 
general make. The erect fertile fronds range from a foot to nearly 
- three feet in height, and the barren ones, about two-thirds the 
17 length, form a lax, spreading rosette, from the centre of which the 
`> fertile ones arise. It is a very common Fern in many districts, but 
affects moist habitats on hedgebanks, the vicinity of streams, damp 
woods, and also, in hilly districts, is found amongst the heather. 
Its pet antipathy is lime, and under culture rain water is an essential 
to successful growth. А compost of friable loam with a plentiful 

Fig. 115. Blechnum spicant 
(pinnze). 





