BRITISH FERNS AS A HOBBY 7 



in our own Ferny districts, or to selective raisings from these within 

 the area of the British Isles. The hobby also embraces the charm 

 of a definite object in country rambles at holiday times, forming 

 an incentive to research in the most picturesque districts of Britain, 

 the hills and dales, mountains and glens, breezy moorlands, shady 

 lanes, and, in short, the thousand and one lovely spots in which 

 Ferns revel, the delight of such wanderings being always enhanced 

 by the chance of a good find and the consequent addition to one's 

 collection of a most interesting " souvenir." Many such places, un- 

 happily, have been depleted of their ferny attractions by the raids 

 of vandals of various kinds. The impecunious villager collects 

 all the seedlings within easy walking distance, and disposes of them 

 by advertisement ; the peripatetic tramp " lifts " the larger speci- 

 mens, and sometimes, on a wholesale scale, attacks a ferny resort, 

 and, with the aid of horse and cart, leaves desolation behind him, 

 finding an outlet for his literal " spoil " in Spitalfields or Co vent 

 Garden, while a third grade is found in the heedless trippers who 

 fill baskets and bags with the wayside Ferns as souvenirs, of which 

 not one in a hundred probably survives subsequent _ neglect en 

 route and at home. 



To these several types of vandals we fear we must add another. 

 Once, in Scotland, we were informed of the habitat of a rare Fern, 

 Cystopteris montana, we believe, and made a pilgrimage to the 

 spot, but not a vestige of a fern could be found, and we were 

 reliably informed that this was due to the fact that a Professor 

 and a body of students had visited the place some few days pre- 

 viously. In an American publication devoted to ferns, a corres- 

 pondent proudly reported his discovery of an extremely rare species 

 in the shape of one plant, to celebrate which he entirely denuded 

 it of its fronds as herbarium specimens, and, not content with this, 

 sent a friend there in the autumn, who depleted it again of the 

 few it had thrown up in the interim, which, as every Fern-grower 

 knows, was tantamount to its destruction. The Fern-hunter proper, 

 on the other hand, would have carefully secured the prize, cultivated 

 it, sown it, and, in that sensible way, would have secured not only 

 its continued existence, but have provided a limitless amount of 

 material for herbarium purposes as well. It would, indeed, be 

 interesting to know how many rarities have found a grave in the 

 herbarium cemeteries of the world, owing to this sort of unin- 

 tended but thoughtless and culpable vandalism. 



Happily, of late years local laws have been put into force to 

 mitigate these evils ; but it is beyond a doubt that the most 

 efficacious remedy would be a general appreciation of the fact 

 that these common forms are greatly inferior compared with the 

 beautiful varieties which they have yielded, and which alone are 

 worthy of cultivation as pet plants. Since the reproach of " van- 

 dalism " has been, perhaps more jocularly than seriously, hurled 



