THE FERN PARADISE. 



often found dark and cool recesses, into the depth 

 of which it is difficult to poer until the eyes have 

 become accustomed to the gloom which pervades 

 them. Sometimes these recesses are of large and 

 sometimes of small extent ; but they are nearly 

 always found associated with falling or dripping 

 water, with mossy stones, and with ferny forms. 

 It may be a rocky cavern in the hill-side, the tiny 

 chasm in a river bank, or perhaps but the dark 

 fissure in the moist embankment of a shady lane, 

 through which, from the higher level above, water 

 perpetually trickles. The enthusiastic Fern- 

 hunter will instantly recall to his mind many 

 such tiny caverns as these hedge-bank fissures 

 furnish, and the intense enjoyment which he has 

 experienced when, during the sultry heat of 

 summer, he has wandered into some cool, green 

 lane, passed under the shadow of overarching 

 shrubs, and paused to rest on some big stone 

 conveniently found fronting a dripping hollow 

 in the hedge-bank. 



Peering into such a tiny hedge- bank cavern he 

 may wonder, whilst he watches with pleasure the 

 diamond sparkle of the dripping water within, 



196 



