226 HOME AND GARDEN 



to the dark peaty earth by the wiry white roots. 

 The Northern Hard Fern (Blechnum horeale) abounds 

 in the haunts of the Osmunda. Of this plenty 

 remains, as it is abundant on the fringes of the 

 boggy peat ground, and not being generally con- 

 sidered so ornamental as some others, it escapes 

 the random collector. Like the Osmunda, it has 

 also a flowering spike, or rather a taller develop- 

 ment of frond which alone bears the fructifi- 

 cation ; the smaller and more numerous fronds 

 being entirely barren. Every now and then one 

 comes upon patches of Blechnum upon quite dry 

 ground, but here it is always stunted and bears 

 fewer fertile fronds. 



Where the wild heathland has been partly tamed 

 and adjoins cultivation, and ditches have been cut, there 

 is the place to look for the large and lovely Lady Fern 

 {AthyriiLm Filix-fmmina). Clear and fresh of colour, 

 stately of port, admirable in the perfect " set " of the 

 large twice-pinnate fronds and in their grace of carriage, 

 arched as they are with a plume-like bending towards 

 their tips — to the Lady Fern must be accorded the 

 place of honour for beauty among our native kinds. 

 This lovely plant seems most at home when growing 

 at the edge of water with its roots taking up their 

 fill of moisture. To see it thus, with its noble fronds 

 mirrored in the face of the still pool, is to see a 

 picture of fern-beauty that can hardly be surpassed. 



The only other of our wild Ferns that in my 



