PROPAGATION 
6l 
similarly prepared compost to that already suggested for the 
first sowing of the spores they maybe left free to grow. The 
process of growth is, in the great majority of species, slow. 
At the end of a year from sowing the spores, they have only 
become very diminutive plants, and their progress to maturity 
is gradual. As they begin, however, to exhibit the familiar 
ferny forms, a little more light and air should be given to 
them. It is a most interesting study to watch, from time to 
time, by means of a magnifying-glass, the gradual groAvth of 
the spores. 
If heat, through the agency of the plant-stove or hot- 
house, be used in the process of germination, the latter will, 
of course, be very materially quickened. Indeed for the 
spores of some of the Ferns from the tropics, heat is abso- 
lutely necessary to induce germination, in the climate of the 
British Islands. 
It will often be found, however, that the natural conditions 
for the germination of spores provided in the Fern-house, in 
the case, or in damp and shady clefts of the garden rockery, 
will cause these infinitesimal life germs to start into exis- 
tence. On damp earth, on the moist surfaces of the stones, 
on the earthenware sides of Fern pots, and even on the very 
stone walls of the Fern-house, they will oftentimes grow. 
It is, indeed, most curious to note the beautiful manner in 
which the green germ life of Ferns appears almost every- 
where within the neighbourhood of the parent plants, wafted 
thither in atomic forms which are borne into the air by the 
lightest breath of wind. Wonderful, indeed, is the power 
and vitality of these marvellous atoms ! 
There are other means by which Ferns can be propagated 
or multiplied than by the agency of spores ; and they con- 
sist of dividing the conjoined clusters of crowns, or the 
creeping rliizomas. The caudex of many of the upright 
growing Ferns is found on examination to consist of two or 
