It will thus follow that, in rightly estimatingTthe economic 

 value of ferns, we must not, as'-is usually done, '[ consider it nil, 

 but place to their credit the jgreat advantages which the world 

 has derived from coal, without which it would have been well 

 nigh impossible to carry on the vast manufactories which now 

 exist, our steam and gas engines, our locomotives by sea and 

 land. What wonderful products are derived from coal ; and 

 from the tar residuum of gas-making there are several hundred 

 different substances extracted — sulphate of ammonia, oils, the 

 wonderful aniline dyes, of all the hues of the rainbow, and 

 the latest product saccharine, the sweetest substance yet 

 discovered. Ferns are mentioned by the older botanists, and 

 their nomenclature handed down to us, but little had been 

 done in the way of cultivation or finding new forms until 

 about 45 years ago. To those who have taken up the study 

 of our native ferns, and have thus been enabled to form 

 a just opinion of the wealth of beautiful forms into which our 

 few British species have sported, either under natural condi- 

 tions or in cultivation, it is a matter of surprise that popularly 

 they should be so little known and so rarely cultivated, as the 

 popular taste is largely created by those who cater for it, the 

 proper display of a good thing being generally the needful pre- 

 liminary to the demand for it. To nurserymen generally must 

 be imputed much of the blame attached to the neglect 

 of these beautiful plants, well-grown specimens of which are 

 very seldom displayed for sale, though exotic ferns with less 

 pretentions to beauty are grown with the greatest care and 

 shown by thousands. An idea seems to prevail that British 

 ferns are common, and only fit for stop-gaps in out-of-the-way 

 corners where nothing else would grow. This ignorance 

 has been in no small degree shared apparently by popular 

 writers on the subject, since in all but two or three works the 

 varieties are relegated to an entirely subordinate position, while 

 in some they arefnot even"alluded to. What should we think 

 of a rose-book or series of rose-books professing by their titles 

 to exhaust the subject,°while confining themselves exclusively 



