XII. 

 THE HARDY FERNERY. 



JHATEVER the garden may owe to 

 hardy flowers, and however varied and 

 attractive its collection of shrubs and 

 trees, it would still be lacking in one of its great- 

 est charms if deprived of ferns. They are the 

 very quintessence of the woods, whether they 

 rise to form a classic urn like the great ostrich, 

 or quiver on ebon stems like the lovely maiden- 

 hair. The very name has a fresh, fragile sound 

 in any language Ftlices, felct, fougtres, 

 Farnen, ferns. The fern offers no excuse for 

 not possessing flowers. Color, other than its in- 

 finitely varied greens and the dark spore-cases 

 underneath or on the margins of the fronds, 

 would mar its beauty. Its green and its grace 

 are its flower, and Nature wisely left it a flower- 

 less plant, the embodiment of beauty in foliage. 

 When well grown the fern carries its character- 



