178 
Choice Ferns for Amateurs. 
at a disadvantage and in bad condition, it is invari- 
ably due to their being kept in an over-heated, 
close stove, and frequently syringed — treatment 
which produces shapeless, emaciated plants deprived 
of all beauty. They should be grown as near to the 
light as possible, either on shelves against the glass, 
or in hanging-baskets suspended from the roof, for 
which purpose some of them are very well adapted. 
'No overhead watering or syringing should at any 
time be allowed, as this is quite as injurious to all 
of them as any extra heat; but they should be 
supplied with an abundance of water at the roots, 
and for this purpose they must be either potted or 
basketed in good fibrous peat and sand, with their 
crowns well above the rim. The compost should be 
very porous, and to that end a small portion of 
sandstone and charcoal broken up into little pieces 
should be added to it. The two great evils to be 
avoided are strong, close heat, and overhead 
moisture, while essentials to their well-being are an 
abundance of water at the roots, an open, porous 
compost for them to grow in, a somewhat airy atmo- 
sphere, and plenty of light overhead. Most, if not 
all, of the Cheilanthes, reproduce themselves freely 
and true from spores, which germinate very readily 
and form young plants in a comparatively short 
time. 
C. alabamensis. 
See Pellcea alahamensis. 
C. californica. 
Calif ornian Lip Fern is the name in North America 
by which this pretty Fern is known. Its elegant fronds are 
borne on densely-tufted, erect stalks about Gin. long and 
of a glossy nature, and proceed from a short-creeping 
rootstock that is very chaffy with rigid, narrow, dark 
brown scales; they are deltoid about Sin. each way, and 
quadripinnatifid. The leafits of the lower side, which are 
much larger than the others, are cut down to the midrib 
into numerous segments, and these again are very sharply 
cut nearly to the centre. The sori, which are roundish, and 
disposed from two to six to a segment, are usually placed 
at the base of the depressions at the ends of single 
yeinlets. 
