82 HANDY BOOK OF 
tough, and of great length, occasionally many yards, and 
often forming a kind of net- work on the perpendicular sur- 
face of damp rocks, Avhich afford no kind of hold to the 
widely-diffused roots. This is the character of the fern 
when favourably situated for its full development ; other and 
smaller plants are mentioned as possessing more root and 
less rhizoraa, the former of which were fixed in a thin layer 
of earth, where a brotherhood of mosses grew luxuriantly. 
The leaves appear in summer, yet rarely before August, 
and seldom attain to maturity till late in October, when the 
fronds of the previous year may be generally seen, dark 
coloured, but unfaded. Botanists who visit tropical regions 
speak of the genus Trichomanes, as comprising many rare 
and beautiful species. Go into the native woods, say they, 
of the West India islands, and observe how gracefully the 
trunks of noble trees are clothed with this elegant natural 
drapery. If you have hitherto passed unheedingly by the 
ferns of your own country, regardless of their symmetry and 
exquisite variety of form, it may be because of their unob- 
tru&iveness ; but you cannot withhold your admiration from 
those of exotic growth. They look down upon you from 
beetling crags they cast deep shadows over your path 
they often rise to a commanding height, waving and quiver- 
ing far above your heads, while such as clothe the trunks of 
giant trees, present in their forms and leaves some of the 
most beauteous developments of vegetable life. 
When speaking of the British species, Sir T. E. Smith de- 
scribes the masses of thecse as being roundish, terminal, and 
imbedded in the margin or segment of the frond. Indusium 
urn-shaped, in texture similar to the frond, and continuous 
with it, forming one leaf dilated upwards, and opening out- 
wards, permanent. Thecae several, sessile, crowded at the 
base of a permanent cylindrical common receptacle, whose 
capillary naked point projects beyond the cover, each 
roundish, with two valves, and bounded by a vertical- 
j ointed ring. 
