22 The Fern Garden. 



six inches of a mixture consisting of sandy peat, sphag- 

 num, and broken sandstone or common hearthstone. 

 Plant in the centre of the station, and place a bell-glass i 

 over ; keep constantly moist, and give air periodically. 

 When it is well established, remove the glass, and leave 

 it to take care of itself. If the fernery is supplied with 

 a stream of water, Cystopteris montana is one of those 

 which should be planted on a ledge of rock where it 

 can have the benefit of a daily trickling of water over 

 its rhizomes. 



Lastrea montana — the hay-scented fern, better known, 

 perhaps, as L. oreopteris — requires similar treatment to 

 that recommended for Cystopteris montana, but should 

 have a soil more inclining to loam. It can scarcely 

 have too much water, provided the position in which it 

 is planted admits of it readily flowing away. 



Polypodium vulgare, the common polypody, will grow 

 in almost any position except in a sheer marsh, and 

 there it soon perishes. When growing wild in the 

 woods, whether on pollard trees or moist banks, it is 

 invariably found rioting in deposits of leaf-mould and 

 wood rotted to powder. Pure cocoa-nut fibre, or equal 

 parts of the fibre and mellow loam, pure leaf-mould, 

 and very dry, tough, fibry peat, in which there are old 

 hummocks of grass, are soils that suit this fine fern to 

 perfection. It will bear sunshine well, but grows more 

 luxuriantly in the shade. In a very dry position where 

 no water can lodge about it, but sprinkled daily all the 

 summer, this fern will attain to grand dimensions, and 

 be one of the most beautiful in the collection all through 

 the autumn and winter months. 



