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THE BOOK OF 
which could be accommodated in a single window. Our native 
Feins vary so greatly in size as well as in fashion, that they 
admit of much greater choice. A number of the evergreen 
varieties keep in fine form through the winter, and do not demand, 
as exotics do, any protection from frost, while, as we have said, 
a pet plant may be made a pet of for one’s lifetime. 
It must, however, be understood that Ferns will not suit for 
sunny windows, in such positions flowering plants do well if 
rationally handled Windows with northern and eastern aspects 
alone are adapted for Fern culture, and even with these the 
dislike of Ferns for wind must be remembered, since to throw 
up a window and thus expose the Ferns adjacent to it to the 
consequent strong draught would be very apt to be detrimental. 
A final advantage with British Ferns is that frequent repotting 
is not essential. If a full grown Fern remains healthy it may 
remain in the same pot for many years. We have one specimen 
Lady Fern which rises year after year in the most robust fasl ion, 
and yet for over twenty years it has remained in the same soil in 
a shallow half-round cork pocket, wired on to a roof slate. It does 
not even get an annual mulching of soil ; for a long time we have 
determined to see how long it will feed as it were, a la chameleon, 
for the pocket holds nothing now but a dense mat of roots. 
Few people are aware what pretty specimen window plants 
even the common wayside Ferns will make if treated as above. 
We once saw a common Hart’s-tongue which completely filled a 
good-sized window ; it was in a huge pot and evidently a very 
old plant, for it bore several scores of bright green fronds fully 
two feet long. We also noted in Guernsey a single plant of 
a finely tasselled Hart’s-tongue, which took up the whole of a 
narrow window, though supported by a sort of trellis. 
One thing is certain, and that is, that no one would revert to 
the common display of a dozen or so of exotic Pterises, all very 
much alike, after a fair experience with a collection of native 
varieties. They may cost a little more to acquire, butonce acquired 
they last, as we have said, a lifetime. 
