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ferns in cultivation, since they were found wild under perfectly 

 natural conditions. Mr. E. J. Lowe's list of varieties, embracing 

 over i, 800 described forms, when analyzed is found to embrace 

 no less than uoo wild finds, i. e., two-thirds, the remaining third 

 consisting of forms which have been subsequently raised from 

 these and varied again on more marked lines. Hence, obviously, 

 it is only this last section that can with any propriety be ranked 

 as cultural or garden productions, while to so term perfectly 

 spontaneous or naturally wild sports is at once misleading and 

 unscientific. 



In these islands the particular hobby of fern hunting has 

 been ridden so long and by so many enthusiasts that the cult has 

 long ceased to embrace species hunting except by neophytes, and 

 in this respect we find a primary difference between the fern 

 study of the States and here. The vast area of the United States 

 and the relatively recent pursuit of fern research on your side 

 admits of the possibilities of new species being found, or at any 

 rate extended habitats of known ones and this, of course, renders 

 species hunting of great interest to those who aim at completing 

 the local flora of their particular localities. Here the work is 

 practically finished and hence the really studious fernist takes the 

 next logical step in fern research by seeking for aberrant types 

 which by their distinct form and reproductive certainly meet the 

 botanical definition of new species. 



In this connection I would point out that for a long time 

 these abnormal types were regarded by the scientific botanist as 

 forming exceptions which only merited to be ignored. As above 

 mentioned they were generally called "garden forms," and as 

 such were relegated to the unscientific limbo of the myriad cul- 

 tivated forms of flowers raised by horticulturists by selection from 

 seedlings of plants which have long been subjected to artificial 

 treatment, high feeding, close culture and so on, to say nothing of 

 disturbed reproductive powers due to crossing. Of late years, 

 however, (thanks, I venture to think, to some extent to my own 

 persistent advocacy of the theory that natural "sports" by these 

 exceptional characters might well betray nature's secrets more 

 freely than stereotyped normals) the wild varieties have received 

 more attention and as a result it has been found that every single 



