. A history of British ferns. Ferns. 28;2 SCALY BPLEENWORT. moreover, other virtues, as they were called, in addition to its medicinal ones: some of these are enumerated by Gerarde, but they appear so very like vices, that I decline transferring them to these pages. Gerarde himself, after dwelling on one of them with great apparent zest, adds : — " But this is to be reckoned among the old wives' fables, and that also which Dioscorides tells of, touching the gathering of spleenwort in the night, and other most vain things which are found here and there scat- tered in old books: from which
. A history of British ferns. Ferns. 28;2 SCALY BPLEENWORT. moreover, other virtues, as they were called, in addition to its medicinal ones: some of these are enumerated by Gerarde, but they appear so very like vices, that I decline transferring them to these pages. Gerarde himself, after dwelling on one of them with great apparent zest, adds : — " But this is to be reckoned among the old wives' fables, and that also which Dioscorides tells of, touching the gathering of spleenwort in the night, and other most vain things which are found here and there scat- tered in old books: from which most of the later writers do not abstaine, who many times fill up their pages with lies and frivolous toyes, and by so doing do not a little deceive yong ;—Ger. Em. 1141. Vitruvius makes a curious asser- tion respecting this fern : he relates that in Crete there is a river which runs between the cities of Gnosus and Cortyna; and that on the side of Cortyna, where Ceterach grows in great abundance, the swine are found to have no spleen ; but on the side of Gnosus, where there is no Ceterach, the pigs rejoice in spleens. Hence the name of spleenwort, or Asplenon, given to this plant, from the Greek a, privative, and aTrMv, the Please note that these images are extracted from scanned page images that may have been digitally enhanced for readability - coloration and appearance of these illustrations may not perfectly resemble the original Newman, Edward, 1801-1876. London, J. van Voorst
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