197 



training permit me to investigate properly transitional 

 stages which must exist in cases like these, but I should be 

 happy to provide material to any one who desires to follow 

 up this line of research. 



Charles T. Druery. 



MYSTERIOUS FERNS. 



Although our utter ignorance of the cause of variations 

 renders every '-sport" a mystery, there are few ferns in 

 cultivation whose origin is so strange as to place them in a 

 separate category, and entitle them specially to be classed 

 as above. In the oidinary way, whether under natural 

 conditions or under culture where considerable numbers of 

 specific forms aie found or raised, we occasionally find 

 more or less isolated specimens which have apparently 

 spontaneously departed from the parental or specific type, 

 and sometimes to a very extraordinary extent. These 

 usually are capable of transmitting the new features to 

 their progeny, and may also propagate by offsets, so that 

 when discovered as adults, and perhaps old specimens, 

 they may be associated with their offspring, but these 

 latter generally are very few in number. In sowings of 

 such varieties, it is also a common thing to find still 

 further departures from the specific form, but usually on 

 similar lines; the species, however, remains unchanged. 



In the cases I purpose citing, the sports have originated 

 in a fashion which gives little or no clue to their origin, as 

 will be seen. Some ten or twelve years ago Mr. George 

 Whit well, of Kendal, made a sowing of Blechnum spicant 

 varieties, and raised a number of plants of that species, 

 but among them he found, not only one, but several plants 

 of an extremely dwarf, congested, and ramose form of 

 Lastvea propinqua, all alike and unassociated with others of 



