THE CROSSING OF FERNS. 



S4B 



Next, Mr. J. E. Mapplebeck, of Hartfield House, near 

 Birmiiigliam, than whom a more obsorvant, careful, and 

 successful cultivator of British ferns, or a more uniformly 

 distinguished exhibitor of them, was never known. 



Next, Mr. James Moly, one of the most original, inde- 

 fatigable, and successful of discoverers, formerly of Hawk- 

 church, now of Charmouth, who, with one or two otliors, has 

 done in tho South with Polystichum angulare what Mr. 

 Barnes and others have done with the Lastreas in the North. 



Last, but not least, Mr. Stansfield, the elder, a botanist 

 of no mean order, and tho original very enterprising head of 

 the well-known firm at Todmorden — now chiefly represented 

 by his grandsons, Messrs. Stansfield of the Sale Nurseries, 

 near Manchester. 



To these five, I believe, is due tho credit of having been 

 the first to recognise practically the fact of the crossing of 

 ferns. There are, however, others who, though coming later 

 into the field, liave contributed so materially to its general 

 recognition that this statement would be incomplete without 

 alluding to them. 



Of those tho first entitled to be mentioned is tho late Mr. 

 A. Clapham, of Scarborough, so long known as one of the 

 most observant, painstaking, and generous of the early dis- 

 coverers and propagators of tho varieties of British ferns. 

 Mr. Clapham was long known as the most successful of all 

 hybridizers of plants in England, but through want of faith 

 in this instance he long held aloof from experiments with 

 ferns ; but when at last (impressed by some of tho results 

 of Ml-. Lowe's ex])oriments) he did give attention to it, ho 

 approached it with all his old keenness of perception and 

 judgment, and therefore his old success. 



The writer of these notes is perhaps entitled to come next ; 

 •and it is a pleasure to him to think that his experiments 



