98 FERN-SEED 



the eighteenth century. As late as 1793 a respectable 

 countryman at Heston, Middlesex, informed an inquirer 

 that when he was a young man he had frequently taken 

 part in catching the "fern-seed" at midnight on the eve 

 of St. John the Baptist. The attempt to catch it was, he 

 said, often unsuccessful, for a plate had to be placed beneath 

 the fern, and the seed must fall into it "of its own accord," 

 without any shaking of the plant. Another searcher of 

 fern-seed reports that the seed must be looked for on 

 Midsummer's Eve, and that the searcher must go barefoot, 

 and with no other clothing than a shift. He stated that 

 when he went to gather it the "spirits" (presumably moths 

 or other nocturnal insects) whisked by his ears, and some- 

 times struck his hat and various parts of his body. At 

 length, when he thought he had gathered a good quantity 

 of it and secured it in paper and a box, he went home. But 

 on examining the paper and the box he found both empty! 

 He does not say how he expected to detect its presence, 

 being a thing invisible! That appears to have been a 

 distinctive and curious feature about capturing fern-seed. 

 The ancients (Greeks and Romans) held that there was 

 no such thing, that ferns did not produce any seed. As to 

 how they propagated no decisive opinion existed. The 

 mediaeval folk improved upon this. They said, "Ferns must 

 reproduce by seed as other plants do, and since the ancients 

 say that ferns have no seed, that must be due to the fact 

 that the seed is there, but is invisible!" Accordingly, they 

 firmly held that ferns produce invisible seed, and then added 

 to this conception, in accordance with the doctrine of signa- 

 tures, the assertion that he who gained possession of some 

 of this invisible seed would himself become invisible. The 

 delightful absurdity of hunting on midsummer's night for 

 invisible seed, as to your success in finding which you could 

 never come to any conclusion except by yourself becoming 

 invisible, seems to have taken firm hold on those who loved 



