62 



and the steep sides of the boundary hills are clothed with 

 trees. Down near the water you may expect to find the 

 Lady Fern (Athyvmm Jilix fcemina) growing to perfection. 

 Where the current is gentle it seems to take pleasure in 

 rising, as it were, from the stream itself. Not far off, but 

 seeming to think more of securing the perfection of shelter, 

 the Broad Buckler Fern [Lastvea dilatata) rises in seques- 

 tered nooks as high perhaps as your shoulder. Splendid 

 as are its rivals, when cultivation has developed their graces, 

 there are, in my opinion, none which in their native state 

 can eclipse the stately beauty of this fern. As we climb 

 higher up the sides, a new truth with regard to the places 

 ferns will decorate introduces itself. So far we have 

 found them prizing shelter and such moisture as is not 

 stagnant, and appreciating a deep, light, vegetable soil. 

 But look at that road which traverses the side of the valley 

 far above the stream. If you examine the hedgerows 

 which bound it, you will find them full of fern-life. Some 

 whose acquaintance we have already made will be there, 

 though very different in size and vigour ; but now the 

 Male Fern (Lastvea filix mas) and the Shield Ferns (Poly- 

 stichum aculeatuin and Polystichum angularc) become the 

 prominent feature. It is not only in hedgerows that they 

 flourish ; all through the woods, particularly where groups 

 of stones offer specially tempting homes, and in natural 

 hollows, the Buckler and the Shield Ferns salute us with 

 vigour of growth and symmetry of form. From the places 

 in which we find them, it is plain that in their case we may 

 dispense with a good deal of the moisture which the Harts- 

 tongue and the Lady Ferns demand, and plainly they are 

 even less particular as to compost, being able to give good 

 account of themselves in any ordinary soil. Like the 

 others, they ask shelter and they abhor stagnant moisture. 



There is one other fern which imperatively demands 

 .notice when the subject of outdoor decoration is upper- 

 most — the Common Polypody {PoJypodiuin vtdgare). If 

 .the decoration of the greenhouse or the furnishing of the 



