Tinted, Variegated, and Crested Ferns. 
9 
not excepted. Variegation is not always constant, 
and so far as European representatives are con- 
cerned, there is not a single species or variety that 
with truth may be said permanently to maintain 
its variegation. Exotic Eerns have often provided 
instances of occidental variegation, though directly 
Fig. 6. One of the most popular of variegated Ferns— Pteris 
cretica albo=lineata, and one, moreover, that has a repu= 
tation for ** coming true" from spores. 
man has attempted to fix such variation from the 
type he has signally failed. 
To Pteris and Adiantum we are chiefly indebted 
for our variegated Ferns, the former more particu- 
larly, and it would be impossible to name a more dis- 
tinctive or popular kind than P, cretica alho-lineata 
(Fig. 6), a variety sold by the hundreds of thousands 
in our plant-markets. P, c. Mayii is another pretty 
