190 



HARDY FERNS. 



from onos, a kind of vessel, and Jcleis, to shut or close : the 

 spore-masses being shut up or covered by the lobes of the 

 pinnae on the fertile fronds. 



ONOCLEA SENSIBILIS (Sensitive), Fig. 77. A most beau- 



tiful hardy Fern from 

 North America. There are 

 in the garden of the 

 Warden of Winchester 

 College large tufts a yard 

 across of this beautiful 

 Fern. Our good friend 

 Mr. Weaver has the 

 charge of that garden, and 

 grows foreign hardy Ferns 

 very successfully, culti- 

 vating them in light soil 

 composed of peat and leaf 

 mould. O. sensibilis has 

 two kinds of fronds, fertile 

 and barren. The fertile 

 spring up amongst the 

 other, growing from 1 to 

 2 feet high, contracted very 

 much, and bipinnated in 

 opposite pairs ; the pinnules 

 on the pinnae curling over 

 the spore-masses. Barren 

 fronds triangular, very 

 broad, of a most beautiful 

 delicate green, pinnated, 

 with lobed margins. This 

 is a most elegant Fern, but 



Fig. 77. Onoclea sensibilis. (Part of barren wn(J wr^n^A nnf in TIPST 

 frond and nearly all of fertile frond medium ^ as SU PP OS 



handling : hence its specific 

 It grows well in a wood where the trees do not stand 



name. 



