The Garden of British Wild Flowers. 325 



flower. It is found in some of the southern counties 

 of England. Cladium Mariscus is also another 

 distinct and rather scarce British aquatic which is 

 worth a place. 



As for the Ferns, it is needless to mention them, 

 considering the immense attention that has been 

 paid them of late years. Whole nurseries are now 

 almost exclusively devoted to the production of 

 British ferns and their varieties. My object is to 

 encourage the culture of things that are compara- 

 tively neglected, and however graceful and beauti- 

 ful ferns may be, and however indispensable the 

 fernery, as an adjunct to the flower-garden, my 

 readers have but to attempt the culture of the 

 handsome British flowering-plants, combined, if the 

 cultivator so desires it, with the best alpines, spring 

 flowers, and herbaceous plants of all countries, to 

 find infinitely more enjoyment therefrom than ferns 

 are capable of affording. 



But though ferns are not in need of advocacy, 

 their allies the Equisetums are, some of them being 

 of graceful and distinct habit. One of the most 

 strikingly distinct and elegant plants in the Oxford 

 Botanic Garden grows profusely along by the wall, 

 in the shady fern border, in that very old and most 

 interesting botanic garden. It is the British Equi- 



Q 



