294 THE FLORAL WOELD AND GAEDEN GUIDE. 



rhododendrons, the roots being introduced in the loam and peat 

 from Wanstead, which we use commonly for special purposes in. 

 cultivation. Hundreds of times I have taken up plants in the 

 height of summer, and potted them, and once had enough to make 

 a great bed, which for a few weeks had a very pretty appearance. 

 In the rockery there are banks consisting wholly of the mellow, 

 silky loam from Wanstead. In one corner, as elsewhere, ferns of 

 many kinds were planted three years since ; but in the midst of 

 them appeared a single frond of bracken, which sprang from a scrap 

 of root brought in with the soil. It was allowed to live, and the 

 next season tufts of bracken appeared, and grew five feet high. In 

 the spring of the present year the whole bank was covered with its 

 woolly and very peculiar callow fronds. Not one was interfered 

 with. It not only covered the whole bank, but pushed through, and 

 put up fronds on the other side of the bastion ; and in the course of 

 this season its luxuriant growth has well-nigh killed out every one of 

 the ferns that occupied the nook previously. In the course of three 

 seasons it has travelled a distance of nine feet from the spot where 

 the first growth appeared, and its rich appearance has secured for it 

 an immunity that no less elegant plant could possibly have enjoyed. 

 If we examine the soil of places where the brake grows wild, we 

 shall find that the best examples are in mellow, fertile loams. The 

 grandest brakes are those that arch out from half-wild hedgerows 

 in damp, shady lanes, where the soil is loam inclining to sand, though 

 in loam inclining to clay it often attains a gigantic stature. It will 

 grow well in spongy peat ; it will not grow well in chalk ; it scarcely 

 thrives in any common garden soil, and it is never met with in 

 standing water. Shade, moisture, and a nourishing mellow soil are 

 the conditions under which it attains to its utmost perfection. The 

 stunted brakes on open commons are usually in hungry sands, 

 though when fully exposed to sunshine, it does not attain a great 

 height, even in the best soils. I have often seen the brake prove a 

 troublesome weed in newly-made lawns ; but the constant use of 

 the mowing machines trivimphs over it at last, and in two seasons it 

 may be annihilated. There is one more point in the cultivation of 

 the brake that requires mention, and that is, that when growing 

 luxuriantly it requires support. When towering up like a palm in 

 the midst of brambles and hedgerow timber, it has abundant sup- 

 port ; but when growing luxuriantly in an isolated position, it no 

 sooner attains its full splendour than the winds lay it low, and 

 drabble its lovely fronds in the mire. The cultivator must afford 

 support, whether the plants are in the rockery or in pots. In the 

 first instance the simplest method is to run a few lengths of tarred 

 string horizontally across and across amongst the stems. This is 

 the plan I am compelled to adopt, to save my glorious tufts from 

 being blown down. A few hooks are inserted in suitable parts of 

 the brickwork, and the cords are made fast before the fronds need 

 them, and when the brakes are in full beauty the supports are 

 invisible. When grown in pots, light painted sticks should be used, 

 and when carefully tied, a good pot specimen of Pteris aquilina 

 grown under glass, is as beautiful as any fern ever seen. 



