THE FERN BULLETIN 



VOL. X. OCTOBER, 1902 NO. 4 



EARLY FERN STUDY IN AMERICA. 



By George E. Davenport. 



My interest in the ferns was first awakened while collecting 

 wild flowers for the Massachusetts Horticultural Society's ex- 

 hibitions of native plants in 1873. When in the woods one day 

 with the late veteran botanist, Mr. E. H. Hitchings, whose fine 

 exhibits of native plants had for some years done so much 

 toward making the beauty of our New England flora known, we 

 became interested in some ferns that attracted our attention on 

 account of their peculiar grace and loveliness, and the desire to 

 know something more about them than we did at that time led 

 us both to begin a systematic study of fern plants. Mr. Hitchings 

 subsequently collected and arranged a large harbarium of native 

 ferns that was especially rich in abnormal forms of the Botry- 

 chium tcrnatum group for the detection of which that keen-eyed 

 observer seemed to have a special gift. After his death his 

 valuable collection was presented, in accordance with his request, 

 to the Appalachian Mountain Club by his children, and it now 

 reposes in that club's general herbarium, where it is available 

 for reference through the custodian. 



The nucleus for my own collection was presented to the 

 Massachusetts Horticultural Society in 1875. an d with its sub- 

 sequent additions, has long been a part of the library where it is 

 always available to fern students for reference on application to 

 the librarian. Besides these collections of Mr. Hitchings and 

 myself, my good friend John Robinson, of Salem, who at that 

 time was one of the group of native plant exhibitors, of which 

 also Mr. Charles YV. Jenks. and Mrs. C. N. S. Horner were active 

 members, made some beautiful collections which he afterwards 

 arranged systematically for the herbarium of the Essex Institute, 

 and where they are available for consultation by fern students. 



