Native Ferns for Shady Places 



115 



Christmas fern, showing last year's 

 fronds and new fiddleheads 



the observant explorer is quick to note for future 



reference. This plant is very rare, and should 



never be taken from the woods. It should be 



purchased of a nurseryman who will guarantee 



that the plants are cultivated by him, not taken 



from the wild. 



Then there is that singular member among our 



native ferns the peculiar habit of which gave rise 



to the Indian designation of "walking leaf." 



The walking fern is seldom met with in consider- 

 able numbers in any one place. The long, narrow 



leaves of this fern are shaped somewhat like an 



elongated arrow-head, the point of which seems to 



seek the earth from which it sprung ; and when this 



leaf completes its growth and its slender tip is rest- 

 ing on the ground, roots are emitted, a new bud 



forms, and soon we find a young plant attached 



to the leaf-tip of the parent, and in its turn reaching out with tiny 



stride toward new territory. The "walking leaf" is perhaps less happy 



under cultivation than arc other and stronger-growing species, but 

 owing to its singular habit this plant has much 

 attraction for the plant collector, and once dis- 

 covered is seldom allowed to rest m the shady 

 quietness of its native woods. 



But these already mentioned may be classed 

 among the modest and retiring members of the 

 great fern family, and there are a number of others 

 that are much more obtrusive, presenting them- 

 selves in great masses of feathery foliage that 

 almost give a tropical aspect to what are generally 

 looked upon as merely "sprout," or second-growth 

 woods, in prosaic New Jersey or Pennsylvania. 



Among these ferns of greater growth is found 



the common "brake" {Pteris aqiiilina), a species 



that is now very common in many portions of 



our country, though in reality an emigrant rather 



The cinnamon fern than a nativc American, for the bracken is sup- 



