THE UNCOILING FRONDS. 15 
ters on the bracken and the lady-fern. 
Asa sort of extension of the “ Doc- 
trine of Signatures” it was assumed 
that since the seed is invisible, it 
would render its pos- 
sessor invisible also. It SY 
was supposed to have 
many other virtues, and 
could be obtained only , 
by the exercise of the 
greatest care and endurance. An 
old legend accounts for the fern’s 
lack of flowers by asserting that 
all ferns bore them until the 
Nativity. In honour of that 
event, the plants that were mixed 
with the straw in the stable put 
forth their flowers. The ferns, 
alone, did not, and were therefore 
condemned for ever afterward FLOWERING FERN. 
to be flowerless. ~ 
Even the early botanists could not understand a proc- 
ess which in such a mysterious way produced new plants 
without the intervention of a flower. As late as 1828, 
Sir J. E. Smith wrote of the idea that ferns do not bear 
seeds, as follows:—‘‘I see no advantage in applying a 
new denomination to the seeds of these and other cryp- 
togamous plants. Hedwig gave the Greek name sfora 
to the seeds of mosses because he conceived them to 
differ in their structure and germination in some indef- 
inite manner from seeds in general. The most malicious 
rival of his immortal fame could not have imagined any- 
thing more subversive of that fame or of his luminous 
