209 



eye is required to spot what may eventually turn out to be 

 a prize, a large specimen is unlikely to escape observation, 

 and would probably be annexed by anyone by whom it 

 was noticed, its survival being a matter of considerable 

 uncertainty. 



In going through my ferns I have been struck this 

 season (1914) with the growth made underground com- 

 pared with the frond development. Two years ago I 

 started to make a new fernery on the north side of a 

 spinny extending partly along one side of my garden. 

 The ground was so foul with Celandine, that I was 

 compelled to burn it to clean it of weeds and seeds. The 

 burning finished, the land was divided into sections, 

 hedges planted, paths made, and a quantity of leaves 

 incorporated with the soil. In this the fern roots 

 revelled, but the hot weather of last year tried them 

 greatly and the fronds suffered. They have, however, 

 made fine fat crowns, and I am looking forward to having 

 something worth seeing to show my ferny friends this 

 season. 



Whilst writing on the subject of Fern development, I 

 was privileged to see Dr. Stansfield's and Mr. Henwood's 

 collections of Polypodiwns with our Editor last year, and I 

 can only endorse all that has been written about them. I 

 have never seen anything approaching such cultivation 

 before, and I am, at a far distance, trying to em^ulate them. 

 Dr. Stansfield possesses probably the finest examples of 

 P. angulave pulchevvimtims extant, his specimens of Moly's 

 Vayiegatiim and Moly's Green I have never seen so fine 

 before. These two are, of course, great rarities, and have 

 been in that collector's hands, I believe, since their dis- 

 covery. Mrs. Thomson's form, whilst robust, had been 

 out of character for years ; a number of youngsters raised 

 from Dr. Stansfield's plant at East Lodge show no signs of 

 pidclieYrimnm character, but I am growing them on in the 

 hope that one regenerate may appear. 



[To he continued.) 



