and the Labelling of Specimens, 141 



by, and the day and date when the specimen first came 

 under your care, and any other little details connected 

 with it you may wish to remember. A little historical 

 book of this description is most interesting, both to 

 yourself and your friends. Under the heading of this 

 or that fern, for instance, you may have reminiscences 

 noted down of some past holiday spent in some of the 

 lovely spots among the hills, valleys, woods and 

 streams of the glorious open country ; a holiday that 

 has left the mind full of happy incidents that will crop 

 up in your sleeping and waking dreams for ever after. 

 The rarer kinds of Wild Ferns are generally found 

 in secluded and sometimes almost inaccessible localities. 

 There the rambling tourists often commits wanton 

 destruction, unthinkingly pulling up the rare and 

 beautiful little Ferns in handfuUs to please a passing 

 whim, or to have remembrances of their visit to the 

 locality. Ten to one the poor Ferns perish, their 

 spoilers having no idea how to take care of them. If 

 they are still fresh when they reach home they put 

 them into a pot, in any sort of way, where they die the 

 slow death of starvation and bad treatment,, and then 

 are thrown out as useless. I would advise such people 

 to let the poor Ferns grow in their own quarters. It 

 is useless to pull them up unless they know how to 

 treat them well and a,re willing to do it. A few fronds 

 preserved and dried would suit their purpose just as 

 well, and leave the locality no poorer in its rare 

 possession. Skilled Fern cultivators will know how to 

 gather a rooted specimen without unduly destroying^ 

 more than they take away. 



