256 GARDENING FOR BEGINNERS 



apt to get drawn or to outgrow the limited space. Our native 

 Filmy Ferns (Hymenophyllum tunbridgense and Wilsonii), and 

 the lovely Bristle Fern ( Trichomanes radicans), of which there 

 are several beautiful varieties, do well in a perfectly close case 

 if pegged down on pieces of limestone or sandstone embedded 

 in an open peaty compost. After pegging down, this should 

 be covered with a handful or so of sandy compost and then 

 watered overhead so heavily that this mulching is washed well 

 into them, thus establishing them firmly, but not burying them. 

 This done, they may be left untouched for months together, 

 save a watering when needed. That beautiful New Zealand 

 Fern ( Todea superba) makes a grand central plant if the case 

 be large, and it is as hardy as grass. The Ferns must never see 

 the sun, and drought is absolutely fatal. They are the children 

 of caves and hollows by, and even under, waterfalls, and shrivel 

 at once if exposed to dry air or sunshine. The need for strong 

 light is consequently less, and hence they may be grown in 

 duskier situations than Ferns that love the air. Judiciously 

 aired and well lighted, the Wardian case may accommodate a 

 small rockery containing some of our small growing Spleen- 

 worts, such as Asplenium trichomanes and its varieties, which 

 constitute a pretty group, and will thrive provided the fronds 

 are not wetted and the plants be carefully installed in rocky 

 chinks, limestone for preference, soil sandy leaf-mould. Pretty, 

 temporary arrangements may also be made by filling the 

 bottom of the case with fresh cocoanut fibre and bedding 

 small thumb pots therein containing small growing specimens 

 of Hart's-tongues, Spleenworts, &c., which can easily be 

 shifted when growth renders it necessary. Good drainage 

 is essential ; water-logged soil breeds a sourness fatal to 

 everything. 



Ferns in the Conservatory. Here, of course, we have 

 ampler room for our plants, but also different conditions. 

 Most conservatories are built for flowers and hence placed to 

 get as much sunshine as possible, and in such we find the 

 Ferns usually either ignominiously dumped under the staging 

 or stunted and out of condition by uncongenial baking. The 

 ideal Fernery under glass never sees the sun at all, a deep 

 ravine, as it were, with a glass roof. However, few of us being 

 millionaires, we must do with what we can get, and hence if 

 we have a conservatory attached to a house and facing north, 

 a large part of it will have sufficient shade from the house itself, 

 and the balance we can shade by screen so as to get at any- 

 rate within measurable distance of our ideal. The prettiest 

 way of dealing with a fernery of this class is to build up rock- 

 work within it, broken up by red-tiled paths in any design 



