THE FERN BULLETIN 



5 



-primeval to be the pride and delight of a great city for- 

 ever. For in its concentrated expression of wild beauty 

 there is doubtless no park of equal area in the State 

 that can surpass it. And when you add to this its 

 varied and almost unique flora is it any wonder that 

 the botanist makes frequent pilgrimages to it? There 

 are exposed cliffs and ledges where some tiny spring 

 comes forth and makes a wet trail downward where 

 liverworts and mosses cling and grasses and ferns lean ; 

 there are rich banks where ferns and flowers jostle each 

 other; marshy places, still pools and swift descents, 

 level meadows and hillside tangles, sterile sandy hill- 

 tops and grassy banks, sunny openings and deep 

 gorges heavy in hemlock shadows ; and the botanist 

 does not need to be told what these varied and kale- 

 dioscopically intermingled conditions mean as ex- 

 pressed in flora. 



When I found this new fern, I was not aware that it 

 was anything more than an interesting freak of the 

 walking fern (Camptosonis rhisophy lifts) which 

 grows abundantly in the park and I afterwards found 

 that Gray calls attention to this resemblance. By more 

 careful examination that evening after reaching home 

 I discovered that I had made a find as well as a mis- 

 take. On August 15, the station was revisited that its 

 distribution and numbers might be ascertained. I 

 found the plants growing in three closely approximate 

 stations or spots which evidently had been one ere the 

 advent of the white man. Numbers 1 and 2 had evi- 

 dently had been cut in two by throwing the high bridge 

 across the gorge at a point 73 feet above the water 

 level. The water from the bridge and gutters above 

 and perhaps the dust seems to be injuring these plants 

 as many of them do not appear flourishing or robust 



