THE FERNY MOORLANDS. 
73 
But you can hear it thundering along in its almost 
subterranean channel. A small tract of marsh 
land intervenes between the Horseman’s Steps 
and Lustleigh Cleave ; and here you may find, 
along by the course of the North Bovey River, 
numbers of the Mountain Buckler Fern, the Hard' 
Fern, the Lady Fern, the Male Fern, the Broad 
Buckler Fern, and others. In this district is to 
be found the somewhat rare Tunbridge Filmy 
Fern, Wilson’s Filmy Fern, and the delicate and 
beautiful Marsh Buckler Fern, From this point 
a precipitous ascent leads on to Lustleigh Cleave. 
We can give no better description of this Cleave 
than by comparing it to a huge fern rockery. By 
some singular agency, the hill-sides have been 
strewn with blocks of granite, of all shapes and 
sizes. It is really difficult to understand how this 
curious phenomenon could have been produced. 
Volcanic action of some kind naturally appears 
to the mind as the agency which must have been 
employed in the original formation of Lust- 
leigh Cleave. But the present effect is singularly 
beautiful. Here, as elsewhere, the ferns have 
