i89 



Mr. J. C. Rugman, Plusterwine, Woolaston, near Lydney, 

 Glos., sends fronds of a very good wild find, about three 

 years ago, of F. angtdave, which we have named F. a?ig. 

 aciitilobiim Rugtnanni ; it belongs to the proliferum section. 



THE BENBOW HERBARIUM COLLECTION 



OF FERNS. 



We are indebted to our friend and member, Mr. C. B. 

 Green, now of Linden Villa, Argyle Road, Swanage, 

 whither he has retired to spend, we hope, many pleasant 

 years, and find many good varieties of Ferns, for a very 

 remarkable and unique discovery. Mr. Green has for a 

 long period devoted himself not merely to Fern study and 

 culture, as his recent article on " My Fernery " demon- 

 strates, but also to the study and collection of the Middle- 

 sex wild flora ; and in this connection some years back he 

 met Mr. Benbow, of Uxbridge, who followed the same line 

 but made no mention of Ferns at all. Mr. Benbow 

 died some few years back, and left his herbarium to the 

 nation, and Mr. Green learning that it was deposited in the 

 Natural History Museum at South Kensington went there 

 to inspect it in connection with the Middlesex flora, and to 

 his extreme surprise discovered that it was accompanied 

 by a collection of several Jmndveds of Fern fronds, repre- 

 senting Mr. Benbow's personal finds in Devon, Dorset and 

 elsewhere, mostly in the 'sixties. A large number of these, 

 particularly of Polystichums, rank with the very finest 

 forms yet discovered, and were accompanied by dates and 

 localities and also notes, which, apart from distinctness of 

 type, rank the finder as amongst the most fortunate, even 

 when compared with such men as WoUaston, Moly, Wills 

 and others of the early pioneers. Of this fact Mr. Benbow 

 appears to have been fully cognizant, but he also appears 

 to have been a very reticent and retiring man, which is 

 evidenced by an autographic slip in the collection, that he 

 desired to remain anonymous. To this unfortunate desire 



