THE COMMON HART'S-TONGUE FERN. 155 
three-fourths of an inch wide, slightly undulated, pinnatifid or 
deeply and irregularly crenate-lobed, with open sinuses between 
the lobes, which are more or less erenately-toothed ; the base is 
subtruncate; and the sori, which are short oblong, or linear, are 
very irregularly disposed; the masses of spore-cases sometimes pro- 
trude between the clefts of the margin to the face of the frond. 
The venation is more or less disturbed, the veins frequently becoming 
united in an irregular manner. The plant is constant under culti- 
vation, reproducing itself from its spores. Its early history is lost. 
The variety has been known since the time of Ray, and has been 
found occasionally in modern times. Sir J. W. Hooker has a 
specimen from Lismore (P Scottish); the late Mr. D. Cameron 
found it near Bristol; and others are recorded to have been met 
with at Fareham; at Edlington near Adwick, by Mr. J. Hardy ; 
near llfracombe in Devonshire, by the Rev. J. M. Chanter; and 
by Mr. James in Guernsey. [Plate LXXXIII A]. 
Another form of this (vivo-polyschides, Olaph ; fecundum, Sim.) 
is in the young state very proliferous. Mr. Clapham, by whom it 
was raised from spores of polyschides, states that he has counted six- 
teen bulbille on a single young plant. The fronds are narrow, 
irregularly sublobate and erenately toothed. Sometimes a dwarf 
cornute frond is produced, thus showing its relationship to mucro- 
natum (16), which was raised from the same parent. 
A third form, raised by Mr. Clapham, appears to be permanently 
of pigmy size; the fronds are from two to three inches high, 
including the stipites, undulate, sometimes furcate at the apex, 
truncate or cordate at the base, and irregularly contracted. This 
if permanent, may be called polyschides pygmœum (M.). 
22. macrosorum (Fée). The fronds in this variety are narrowish, 
a foot or more in length, and upwards of an inch in breadth, the 
margin frilled or undulated as well as irregularly lobed, the lobes 
often deeply separated, but not having open sinuses, and bordered 
with a series of bluntish teeth; the base is truncate; the venation 
is sometimes disturbed, becoming here and there reticulate, and 
the sori are short, oblong, and irregularly disposed. This handsome 
form resembles polyschides (21), having the same kind of deep 
occasional incisions, but they are less manifest, being hidden by 

