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these regions as it is now to obtain our remote Arizonian and 

 Californian species. The effects of the Spanish War of 1898 on 

 our relations to tropical vegetation have been wide reaching, 

 and it remains for American Anglo-Saxon students to study 

 exhaustively the ferns of all America, the Hawaiian Islands, and 

 the Philippines whose treasures are as yet scarcely entered upon 

 by Europeans even. 



But these thoughts take us far beyond the original intent of 

 my subject yet the}' only emphasize the fact that the world is a 

 unit and even in fern study we will do well to bear in mind not 

 to become too narrow in our conceptions. We can no longer 

 look to Europeans as authorities on ferns. We must make com- 

 parative studies of the European species and our own. We can- 

 not get a grasp of what our Floridian and Arizonian species 

 really are without studying the same species from their normal 

 range farther south where they are not affected by conditions 

 arising from being "at their northern limit." In some genera a 

 proper conception of the relations must be brought out by a 

 knowledge of species from even more remote localities. It is 

 only in a narrow accommodated sense that "he is the best 

 naturalist who knows his own parish well" for in knowing only 

 that, one is liable to draw wrong conclusions and gain an im- 

 proper perspective of the true relations of things. 



Columbia University, New York. 



BRITISH FERN CULTURE. 



By Charles T. Druery, F. L. S. 



Responding with much pleasure to Mr. Clute's expressed 

 desire for a short article in the above connection. I start out by 

 remarking that the term "fern culture" in connection with the 

 numerous departures from the specific forms which have origin- 

 ated in these islands is largely misleading, ranking in this re- 

 spect with that of "garden varieties." which is far too frequently 

 used by the botanist. Culture has had absolutely nothing to do 

 with the origination of the great bulk of the forms of our native 



