74 HARDY FERNS. 
some of these Filmy Ferns much finer than 
others, and I call the finest Tunbridgense ; but I 
am afraid that in reality I have only found the 
Unilaterale, and I am obliged to own that when I 
have found it I have never kept it alive for any time. 
I have planted it on a brick in a running stream, 
but a rush of water washed it off; I have tried 
it in a flower-pot with a glass over it, but a little 
inattention, or a visit — and I found it damped ofi". 
Still it is worth hunting for, if only to see it at 
home sporting with Naiades and Dryades. It 
seems a graceless thing to take it away to pine 
and die, either in solitude or with companions 
uncongenial to it. I always feel loth to tear 
the little Fern from the rock it so prettily 
adorns ; there is something sad in the look of 
the bare uncomplaining stone when the com- 
panion that gave it all its beauty and its life is 
gone. 
I was once walking in the country with one who 
spared himself but little recreation from a life of 
toil in London— not literary toil only, for the 
