8 THE FERN PARADISE. 



The book of Nature is indeed beautiful to those 

 who can read it ; but those who cannot read it all 

 can read a part of it. Some of its stones are full 

 of sweet simplicity. Page after page can sometimes 

 be turned, and the reader will encounter nothing 

 to dismay him ; nothing even to puzzle him. But 

 the simple study of Nature is too frequently made 

 a hard task by those who profess to teach. Botany 

 is one of the most beautiful of natural studies, 

 because it tells us all about the glorious vegetation 

 which springs up from the earth. 



Yet a.re there not thousands who do not under- 

 stand botany ? To some the study is too difficult. 

 Others can find no opportunities for pursuing it. 

 But all would like to know something of the beau- 

 tiful vegetable world ; something less less formal, 

 less difficult than what is usually to be found in 

 books, and something more than can be learned 

 from the mute language eloquent nevertheless in 

 its muteness of the plants themselves. Why is it 

 that so few attempts are made to render popular 

 the study of plants ? Our artists on paper and 

 :anvas attempt to reproduce the gorgeous colouring 



