IG A PEEK BOOK FOR EVERYBODY. 



Any excess of water whicL. may have been supplied may 

 be drawn off by the plug or stopcock at the end. 



Planting the case may next occupy attention ; and this 

 may be done either by inserting potted ferns, and covering 

 the pots with the soil, or employing only cocoa-nut refuse 

 for the purpose ; or the ferns may be transplanted directly 

 into the soil. Special precautions must be taken with 

 species having creeping rhizomes, which must be provided 

 with little elevations on which to be planted. 



The selection of species must depend greatly on the 

 localization of the fernery when completed. If it is to 

 be placed in a room in which a fire is constantly kept 

 during the winter, more tender species may be cultivated 

 than if the case is intended to take its chance in some 

 room whence fires are generally excluded. Many foreign 

 species may be added with advantage to those which are 

 natives of this country, half of which, at the least, are too 

 large for any mo derate- sized fernery. After the enume- 

 ration of British species contained in this work, a brief 

 account is appended of some of the hardy species in 

 cultivation, from which a selection may be made. 



In placing this fernery, when completed, the full glare 

 of sunlight should be studiously avoided: a northern 

 aspect is good, north-western is perhaps the best. When 

 travelling through North Wales in search of ferns, we 

 ascertained the aspect of a great number of flourishing 

 fern patches by means of a pocket compass, and found 

 invariably that it was north-west ; a fact which we have 

 taken care to remember. 



It is by no means essential that an elaborate fern-case 

 should be constructed at a great expense to cultivate a 

 few ferns. Eor a few shillings a very respectable cottage 

 fernery may be established. Two or three ferns miy be 

 planted in a common flower-pan, which is naturally porous, 

 not being glazed either inside or out. This may be placed 

 in a round earthenware dish, with the space of an inch all 

 around between the outside of the pan and the inside of 

 the dish. This intervening space may be filled with bog 

 moss {Spliagnim), and a bell-glass over all, or only over 



