BLADDER FERNS. 



they are much more deeply cleft or serrated than 

 is the case with the leaflets in Fragilis ; so deeply 

 cleft, indeed, sometimes, that the leaflets are 

 divided into lobes or divisions. 



The Alpine Bladder Fern is an exquisitely 

 beautiful little plant. It will grow under cultiva- 

 tion as readily as Cystopteris fragilis, and may be 

 planted either in the open air, on the Fern rockery 

 in a cool shady spot, in pots in the house, or under 

 the protection of a covering- of glass. For soil the 

 lightest composition must be made. Peat, silver- 

 sand, light friable loam, and leaf-mould, in equal 

 proportions. If planted in a pot there should be 

 in the bottom of the pot a thick stratum of broken 

 flower-pot or soft broken bricks, together with 

 some pieces of charcoal, the charcoal being intro- 

 duced to keep from the roots of the plant the 

 stagnation which might arise from the filtration 

 of the water through the drainage of broken 

 flower-pot or bricks. Like Cystopteris fragilis, 

 our little Cystopteris regia has a tufted root-stock, 

 from which spring clusters of beautiful, delicate, 

 herbaceous, charmingly green fronds. 



L 2 



323 



