PROPAGATION, DEVELOPMENT, AND CULTUEE. 25 



would keep its sides always damp ; the spores scattered 

 over the sides of this moistened porous earthenware would 

 find a proper nidus for their development, which might thus 

 be watched with great facility. It is to be borne in mind, 

 however, that the seedling plants are not so readily trans- 

 planted from an earthenware or stone surface, as they are 

 when growing on the soil. 



The general features of culture which it will be sufficient 

 here to notice are shade, shelter, and abundance of mois- 

 ture, neither of these being, however, essential to all the 

 species, but when judiciously combined producing the con- 

 ditions under which all the species admit of being very suc- 

 cessfully grown. 



In the garden, Ferns seem only appropriately introduced 

 on what is called rockwork, which generally means a bank 

 of earth irregularly terraced with misshapen fragments of 

 stone, or by some other hard porous material, the vitrified 

 masses formed in the burning of bricks being that most 

 commonly substituted. With taste in the distribution of 

 these and such like materials, and in the planting of the 

 Eerns, a very pleasing effect may be produced ; and on 

 rockwork of this kind, if it be erected in a shaded and 

 sheltered situation, and liberally supplied with percolating 



