28 FERNS IN THEIR HOMES AND OURS. 



are themselves divided into species. Now, the 

 species are again divided into varieties. Where 

 there does not seem to be sufficient reason to 

 make a separate species for it, the new fern to be 

 described is placed as a variety of some already 

 existing species. Here authors differ as much as 

 anywhere else. For instance, Hooker, in " Synopsis 

 Filicum," unites under Ophioglossum nudicaule six 

 species of other authors, he considering them vari- 

 eties only. Besides the ordinary varieties found 

 in nature, the desire for new ferns has given 

 rise to an enormous number of cultivated or gar- 

 den varieties. These are " sports " from plants, 

 carefully preserved and perpetuated by nursery- 

 men and gardeners. A few among these are 

 perhaps beautiful or curious ; but the great majori- 

 ty are horrible deformities of the original species 

 from which they started, and serve no useful 

 purpose whatever, except perhaps to prove how 

 much a species may be made to vary in a short 

 time, and to compare this with what might be 

 done in one of the earth's great periods. The 

 writer has before him the catalogue of a dealer 

 who advertises fifty-one varieties of Asplenium 

 Filix-f&mina ! Cooke, in his little book, "A 

 Fern Book for Everybody," remarks that some 

 painstaking people have hunted up and described 

 eighty-five varieties of Scolopendrium milgare, 

 "love's labor lost," or at least fearfully wasted 



