CULTURE OF HARDY FERNS. 
547 
Trichomanes radicans var. Andrewsii. 
CULTURE OF HARDY FERNS. 
An intelligent modern writer thus expresses 
himself : — " If any pleasure can be called 
bright, beautiful, and lasting, it surely is a 
love of nature, particularly of the green 
things that clothe the earth's surface. The 
contemplation of them gives a tone of health 
and freshness to the mind, and the culture of 
them vigour to the body." In accordance 
with this sentiment, we must claim for the 
family of ferns a larger share than they have 
hitherto received of that attention which is so 
freely accorded, by almost every class, to the 
culture of ornamental plants. In doing this, 
we can hardly claim the merit of leading the 
public taste ; for, in fact, a tendency in the 
direction we desire to point, has already mani- 
fested itself This tendency we would by all 
means encourage, under the full persuasion 
that the writer above quoted has touched the 
very key-string of healthful recreation, and 
innocent though engrossing enjoyment. It is 
true that ferns are not attractive and cap- 
tivating from any gaudiness that they possess : 
indeed, on the contrary, it is their very sim- 
plicity which gains them their admirers. 
Devoid of painted blossoms, they wear only 
the cheerful tints of " nature's livery," varied 
as it is through the many shades which inter- 
vene between the bright and transparent, and 
the deeply-saturated and opaque. It is in 
their forms, however, that the ferns, as it 
were, command admiration : here they are 
unapproachable. No form that art can devise, 
can for a moment be compared, for grace and 
elegance, to nature's models, as displayed in 
the vegetable world ; and no other department 
of the vegetable world can compare, in this 
respect, with the unblossoming ferns. Even 
the common bracken which clothes immense 
tracts of the uncultivated wastes of this 
country, and in this condition is, perhaps, one 
of the least beautiful of its race, is super- 
latively elegant under circumstances more 
favourable to its full development. We have 
ourselves seen this common and despised plant 
growing from the hedge-banks on either side 
of a damp shady lane, towering far above the 
heads of the passers-by, and waving its broad 
feathery fronds in the gently-agitating breeze ; 
and we have been riveted to the spot, en- 
tranced in admiration of its wildly-luxuriant 
elegance and extreme gracefulness. And so 
it is with many others. There is the lady- 
fern, which has, indeed, been styled the queen 
of ferns, and described as being '•' exquisitely 
and super-eminently beautiful : " 
" Her texture as frail as thougli shiv'ring with fright." 
This, placed under circumstances favourable 
to its full development, becomes one of the 
most lovely of its race, its texture transpa- 
rent, its composition extremely light, feathery, 
and compound, and its whole form drooping 
in varied curves, each a " line of beauty." 
These examples are from the wild Jems of 
our native country, where, indeed, many 
others, hai-dly giving place to them in beauty 
— if, indeed, they do not exceed them in some 
respects — may be met with. We have pur- 
posely alluded to theon for this very reason, 
because they are within the means of all, 
from the peer downwards to the cottager ; — 
ay, and not confined to the mature of either 
rank, but accessible even to children, in whom 
it were well to foster a taste for garden exer- 
cise, and to whom no group of ornamental 
plants may be so strongly recommended as 
those under notice. 
" Ferns," says another writer, — and we 
must quote his happy remark, — " ferns con- 
stitute so beautiful a poition of the creation, 
whether they ornament our ruins with their 
light and graceful foliage, wave their bright 
tresses from our weather-beaten rocks, or 
clothe with evergreen verdure our forests or 
our hedgerows, —that it seems next to im- 
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