314 Transactions. — Botany. 



one sure to evoke feelings of an opposite character in the 

 bosom of the beholder, for, if the former were of the " Pen- 

 seroso" class, these would as surely pertain to the converse 

 or the " Allegro " one. 



Here, then, in another umbrageous solitude, is a similar 

 lot or small natural secluded grove of tall tree-ferns, generally of 

 the genus Cyathea ; but their stout stems are entirely without 

 that solemn-looking dead grey-brown wrapping, and, instead, 

 they possess a most beautiful and elegant closely-compacted 

 light-green and glossy dress, composed of very small living 

 creeping ferns, pendulous and thickly imbricated like tiles on 

 the roof of a house, often delightfully glistening when visited 

 by a passing ray of sunshine. These small ferns are mostly 

 composed of two species only — Trichomanes venosum, Br., and 

 Hymenophyllnm flabellatwn, Labill. — and they do dwell to- 

 gether apparently in the most pleasing harmony, as if enjoying 

 life. They often completely enwrap the whole large and tall 

 trunk of the tree-fern from base to apex, all green and flourish- 

 ing, without showing the smallest spot of intervening open 

 space, evidently the perennial and steady growth of many 

 years. These little ferns are something more than of epiphy- 

 tal development, pertaining rather to that of quasi-parasitical, 

 for their creeping rhizomes and roots penetrate deeply into or 

 among the outer dead matted stipites and fibres of the tree- 

 ferns on which they flourish. 



Perhaps I had better end here respecting the tree-ferns. 

 But then you, my audience, "dwellers at home at ease," would 

 only know half, — and that of my woodland joys : so it is but 

 fair you should also know a little of my sorrows, other- 

 wise you would remain in happy ignorance of them. These, 

 however, I shall only briefly touch on, owing to the extreme 

 disagreeableness of the theme. 



And first of my majestic venerable-looking group. On my 

 return on one occasion to one of those dear old haunts, I 

 found, to my horror, that some Goth or churl had recently 

 been there, and had set fire, separately, to each one of those 

 eight or ten big tree-ferns ! just to burn off their thick dry 

 wrappings, the undisturbed growth of many years, and so to 

 make a blaze ; and there their blackened and half-charred 

 stems stood, with their once lovely elastic crowns of fronds 

 sadly scorched and stiffened above them — a piteous sight ! I 

 could fancy they even reproved me, and I could have wept. 



I had long had good reasons for believing that my visits to 

 that unfrequented part of that old forest, so difficult of access, 

 were watched by one or more of the underlings or stockmen of 

 the neighbouring sheep-station, w T ho, I suppose, on his going 

 thither after me, and not discovering what it was that could 

 have induced me so frequently to visit that place (for the old 



