2 PERNS OP GREAT BRITAIN. 



finding this bestowed on the study of these beautiful 

 plants. It is pleasant to see the rambler in the country 

 searching through green lane or by dripping well for 

 the feathery fern, or wandering over the open moor with 

 his handful of 



" Heath-bells dark, and bracken green." 



It is pleasant to see the graceful sprays of these plants 

 made the objects of care and culture, and to mark them 

 while waving over fern banks and fern walls, which 

 have been reared for the purpose of adapting soils and 

 situations, light and shadow, so as would best suit the 

 ferns taken from various wild spots. Means are thus 

 afforded for their study to those who have leisure, while 

 the common garden rock is often, also, adorned by the 

 fronds of some of the more hardy kinds ; and some of 

 the most rare and delicate may be found in the green- 

 house, or even in the dwelUng-rooms of the city, forming 

 an ever- verdant miniature forest in the glass cases of ,Mr. 

 Ward's invention. Even the Herbarium, with its dried 

 specimens, gives a far better idea of the usual condition 

 of the fern than it does of flowering plants. Leaves 

 and blossoms may, by great care, be preserved so as to 

 retain somewhat of their elegant form, and a httle of their 

 natural beauty of colour. The poet- could remember 

 with joy the teachings of one who showed him 



" How to make sweet pictures of dried flowers, 

 CuU'd in the lanes when glow'd the sultry hours ; 

 Then press'd and dried, and all on lawn dis-spread, 

 To look as infants do that smile when dead." 



But the fern spread, out on the page scarcely gives us 



