FERN GROTTOES OF FLORIDA 71 
“Timestone rocks at Istachatta,’’ collected by him 
July 24, 1894, and distributed by Mr. Nash as his No. 
1396a. In the summer of 1898 Prof. A. 8S. Hitchcock 
walked along the railroads of Florida from Monticello 
to Brooksville, thus passing very near the fern wonder- 
land, but apparently without being aware of it. Soon 
afterward he published a list of Florida plants, based on 
his own collections and those of Curtiss and several 
others, and in this (Trans. Kan. Acad. Sci. 17: 96-97. 
1901) nine species of ferns, including all those previously 
mentioned, are reported as having been collected at 
“Lake Tsala Apopka” or “Istachatta,”’ by Curtiss. 
Going back a little in our narrative, Mr. Curtiss was 
there again on August 18, 20 and 23, 1897, and collected 
in “Rocky woods near Istachatta” the following ferns 
using his names and numbers): Adiantum tenerum 
(5961), Asplenium firmum (5962), A. myriophyllum 
(5963), Aspidium trifoliatum (5964), Phegopteris reptans 
(5965), Asplenium parvulum (5966), and Pteris Cretica 
(5967). 
In the Plant World (5: 68-70) for April, 1902 (pub- 
lished the latter part of May), Mr. Curtiss published a 
description of the locality, or localities, in question, 
which is so interesting that part of it will be quoted 
here, notwithstanding that the original is still compara- 
tively accessible. He says: 
“Tt was early in April, 1881. On the morning of the day before, 
at Gainesville, I had dropped a $20 gold piece into a liveryman’s 
hand for a four days’ ride in a wagon with two horses and a negro 
river. . , Near noon of the second day, we came to a dense 
forest with wild orange trees on its border. On entering the forest 
. 
it seemed as if I had suddenly entered another world, so different 
of cattle sticking in the narrow mouth of a chasm. 
had evidently slipped in from an overhanging bank and been held 
by the horns till their bodies dropped off. Advancing into the dark 
