8 FERNS : J3EITISH AND FOREIGN. 



are of sufficient importance to be worthy of a passing 

 notice. The first of these in point of date is the 

 " Enumeratio Plantarum Horti Regii Botanici Bero- 

 linensis," by Wildenow, published in 1809, with a 

 Supplement by Schlechtendal, bringing it down to 

 1813. We are thus enabled to compare the num- 

 bers in the Kew and Berlin gardens at the same 

 period; which were eighty- three in the former, and 

 thirty in the latter, including eleven not known at 

 Kew. During the succeeding nine years more atten- 

 tion appears to have been given to Ferns at the 

 Berlin garden ; for Link, in his first " Enumeratio," 

 in 1822, describes ninety-one exotic species, which 

 is more than double the number then existing at 

 Kew. After this the increase in number was still 

 more rapid; for in the second edition of Link's 

 " Enumeratio," published in 1833, no less than two 

 hundred and thirty-nine are described; and in the 

 third, in 1841, two hundred and fifty-eight, exclusive 

 of varieties. 



By this time, however, the collection at Kew had 

 received large additions, both through importations 

 of living plants and by raising from spores. In 

 1845 it was so extensive that I was induced to 

 draw up a classified enumeration, which was pub- 

 lished as an appendix to the Botanical Magazine for 

 1846. The number of exotic species there enume- 

 rated is three hundred and forty-eight, and I do not 

 think many were to be found in other gardens in 

 this country which were not at Kew, so that the Kew 

 list may be taken as a guide to the number then 

 in British gardens generally. 



Four years later, Kunze, of Leipzig, contributed to 



