34 WHERE TO FIND FERNS. 



to search in, and the Author has found both ferns in 

 Torbay. 



And now, reluctantly leaving Devonshire and its ferny 

 scenes, let us illustrate some fern habitats in other places. 

 And, first, a view shall be given of the far-famed Cheddar 

 Cliffs (page 33), an especial haunt of the Limestone 

 Polypody, which grows, as the True Maidenhair is also 

 asserted to grow, in the moist picturesque nooks of 

 this rocky region. Rich as it is in many other of the 

 common kinds of fern, the Cheddar district of Somerset- 

 shire must be especially remembered for the two species 

 just mentioned. 



In the succeeding pages the reader will often be told 

 of rocky habitats for such of the rarer ferns as the 

 Woodsias, the Holly Fern, the Bladder Ferns, the 

 Spleenworts, the Rigid Buckler Fern, and the rarer 

 Polypodies. Here (page 35) is such a one, and, should 

 the fern-hunter be in any part of the country where, as 

 the succeeding lists will tell him, he may hope to find 

 some of these rarer ferns, let him not neglect to carefully 

 search such likely spots. It would be really difficult 

 for any one with a real eye for ferns, to pass without 

 peering into all moist crannies of such rocks, where 

 " something green " suggests a ferny presence, without a 

 most careful scrutiny. 



On page 36 is yet another bit of suggestive rock. To 

 climb it may be difficult ; yet a jutting fragment here and 

 there, for the feet to safely secure a hold, and a friendly 

 shrub growing out from the cliff-side will often tempt one 

 to climb, if only a little way, to get at some very graceful- 

 looking clump, that certainly must be a fern of some 

 kind, and that may chance (who knows ?) to be a rare 

 find, unseen or unexamined by all previous passers-by. 



So much for the dry rocky places beloved of the 

 ferns. Now for the moister ones. There is a species 

 of dry eloquence in rocks everywhere. But they seem 

 to speak when the mountain torrent rushes over them. 



