THE ALTERNATE-LEAVED SPLEENWORT. 129 
This rare Fern is one which does not thrive under cultivation, 
except with careful management. If potted in porous soil, with the 
crown well elevated, and covered by an elevated bell-glass in a close 
shaded frame or cool house or pit, so as to be protected from drip, 
it will generally grow with tolerable vigour; but the plants are very 
liable to perish under confinement in winter. The best safeguard 
is, not to allow water to reach the crowns, and at the same time to 
keep the roots just moderately moist, and not to suffer the bell- 
glasses, employed to protect them from the risk of being wetted, to 
injure them by retaining a constantly damp atmosphere, which they 
wil do if they are kept closed. For open rock culture, where it 
might be desirable to employ protection from. atmospheric changes, 
the plan of using glasses furnished with a couple of small apertures ` 
opposite each other, as vents, near the top, so successfully adopted 
by Mr. Clowes in cultivating Hymenophyllum, would no doubt be 
found congenial to these shy-growing mountain Aspleniums. The 
plants may be increased by dividing the crowns. 
The species is so rare that varieties are scarcely likely to occur in 
a wild state, and we do not know of any which have been observed. 
A new form, showing a slight variation from the normal condition, 
has however been produced in cultivation :— 
1. acutidentatum (M.) This variety, which is we believe unique, 
differs from the usual form, in having the teeth of the lobes acute 
instead of obtuse. It has been raised by Mr. Sim of Footscray, 
and is an interesting sport. [Plate LXXX B.] 

