-48 



CASSELL'S POPULAR GAEDENING. 



ground in order, the tools or instruments needed 

 are lines, measuring-rod, tape, level, torning-rods, 

 pegs, and stakes. The design having been well 

 wrought out on paper, and roughly sketched upon 

 the ground, for the purpose of putting the best 

 soil where it will be most required, exactitude and 

 correctness are the only injunctions needed to the 

 successful working out of the designs. 



Turfing, and Planting of Permanent 

 Plants. — It is presumed that the ground was well 

 rolled and beaten down before the final marking out 

 was done ; and, the lines being still intact, the turf 

 ought to be laid an inch over the marks, to admit of 

 cutting the edges straight after the turf has been 

 beaten or rolled down. Banks and slopes require 

 much care and labour to get them to the same angle 

 and firm throughout. Perhaps the most certain 

 way of securing this is to add three or four inches 

 more than will finally be required, and after beating 

 very hard, to put in the levelling pegs to the exact 

 angle, and shave ofE the surplus soil with spades. 

 By stretching a liae from a peg at one end to that 

 of the other, correctness of outline will be assured. 



The edgings being cut, the soil of the beds should 

 be dug up, and left rough till planting-out time, 

 but the planting of shrubs and hardy plants gene- 

 rally should proceed at once. To what extent these 

 should be present on a parterre or formal terrace 

 garden is a moot ^Doint ; but at any rate there should 

 be a goodly sprinkling of shrubs, if only to take off 

 the appearance of baldness at the dull season, when 

 the beds, if not empty, are virtually in that case, so 

 far as any life-imparting properties are concerned. 

 Our own inclination is not only to use plants as 

 sentinels on the grass, as a break to the various plots 

 of beds, as well as at the angles of walks, but also in 

 the centres of the flower-beds, thus in some measure 

 securing permanency of furnishing all the year 

 Tound. This doeS not in any degree detract from the 

 summer effect, but rather heightens it, there now 

 being many shrubs that harmonise in general contour 

 of growth and colour with the rarest sub-tropicals. 



The clipping and shearing of trees and shrubs into 

 all sorts of ridiculous forms and shapes, which once 

 was general in gardens of formal design, is fast be- 

 coming obsolete, and that without a pang of regret 

 from any one. Yet the notion had some merit, and 

 might, perhaps, have been continued np to the 

 present time, had not there been such rapid advances 

 made in raising and introducing many kinds^ of 

 shrubs of a sufficiently formal type without ha^'ing 

 recourse to the shears. Such are Cupressus Laivso- 

 niana erecta, about a dozen kinds of Retbwspora, 

 several Junipers and Thujas. Besides these there are 

 older types of plants, such as Yuccas, variegated Box, 



golden Yews, Hollies, &c., which are just as useful 

 and appropriate for terrace-planting as are the 

 first-named. In addition to these classes of plants 

 for isolated positions on turf or the middle of beds, 

 there are others that may be pressed into the service 

 of the parterre for flanking a wall which it may be 

 desired to conceal, or for making a hedge in lieu of 

 a wall. The best of this class are Cupressus Lawsonii 

 and Thujopsis borealis. 



It only remains to add that, as soon as planted, 

 supports should be applied to each plant to prevent 

 wind-wa-ving, which not only throws them out of 

 the perpendicular, but breaks off new rootlets, and, 

 in consequence, materially checks the growth of the 

 new plants. 



FEENS. 



By James Bkittex, F.L.S. 



mTROBUCTIOJ<i. 



BEFOEE proceeding to describe the more impor- 

 tant groujjs of ferns, we will devote a few lines 

 to pointing out how^ ferns differ from flowering plants. 

 The absence of blossoms at once strikes the observer : 

 the place of these is supplied by the variously-shaped 

 groups of small bodies which we shall notice on 

 the back of the fronds — sometimes beiag arranged in 

 roimd groups of the size of a pin's head, sometimes 

 larger in circumference, sometimes placed in long 

 lines, and always of a yellow or brownish colour, 

 and covered to a greater or less extent with a 

 membranous scale. The small bodies are little 

 capsules (called sporangia), which contain the spores, 

 these being analogous to the seeds of flowering 

 plants ; the round or narrow groups of sporangia 

 are called sori ; and the membrane which covers 

 them is known as the indusium. 'Wh^en. the spores 

 are set free by the bursting of the sporangia, and 

 faU in a damp place, they shortly germinate. The 

 result is — not a young ascending plant and descend- 

 ing root, as in flowering plants, but — a very small 

 membranous green body, which lies flat on the 

 ground, and sends out delicate rootlets from its 

 under side. This is known as the prothallium. On 

 this prothallium are produced minute bodies which, 

 speaking generally, correspond to the stamens and 

 pistils of flowering plants. The male bodies are 

 called antheridia : they are minute cellular sacs, 

 which, when ripe, burst, setting free a number of 

 spirally-twisted mo^dng bodies, called spermatozoids. 

 The female bodies are called arcliegonia : they are 

 bottle -shaped, and contain a minute cell at the base, 

 called the oosphere. Fertilisation takes place by the 

 action of the spermatozoids on the oosphere: pass- 

 ing down the neck of the archegonium, they fertilise 



