64 



THE FERN BULLETIN 



the principles upon which such directions hinge, will 

 make it of much value to the gardener whether ama- 

 teur or professional. The book, however, is not a 

 mere gardening manual. It discusses soils and their 

 origin, the fundamentals of landscape work and plant 

 breeding, and the effects of heat, light and moisture 

 upon plants in general. There will also be more than 

 200 illustrations. 



Ferns' Weighing a Ton. — In the tropics ferns often 

 attain the height of small trees, but their trunks are us- 

 ually so slender that they never are of any great weight. 

 For the heaviest trunks we must look among lowlier 

 species, where the circumference of the short trunk in 

 some cases is so great that immense weights are at- 

 tained. In Australia and New Zealand there grows a 

 relative of the common cinnamon fern named Todaea 

 barbata which quite takes the palm in this respect. The 

 trunks are great rounded mosses five or six feet high 

 and at least twenty feet in circumference, most of the 

 upper surface being beset with living fronds. Speci- 

 mens have been found with trunks that were estimated 

 to weigh more than a ton and a half. 



