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FERNS : BRITISH AND FOREIGN. 
bunches of grass, as also the remarkable Ophioglossum 
pendulum, which may be likened to ribands or bands 
hanging loose and waving with the wind, often many 
feet in length. These plants succeed in a small 
quantity of soil, firmly fixed in pots, with pieces of 
soft stone or potsherds, and the pot hung against a 
shady wall or pillar. For this purpose the pot should 
have a flat back, with the front rim lower than the 
back, so as to allow the fronds to hang quite free of 
the pot. 
Neottopteris Australasica, and a few Aspleniums 
nearly allied, such as A. sinuatum and A. crenulatum, 
of precisely the same mode of growth, are of erect 
fasciculate vernation. Their roots being of peculiar 
mossy and delicate nature, they are not adapted 
for deep insinuation of stiff soil, but are rather 
what may be termed aerial. Two-thirds of their 
mass is produced above the surface of the soil. 
Substantial but open material is therefore required, 
of very rough, fibry peat, and porous, broken bricks, 
or soft sandstone, in equal parts ; very little pot- 
room is necessary; a shallow pot of 18 inches 
diameter, with such material, will support a plant 
of two dozen fronds, and none less than 3 feet 
6 inches long and 8 inches broad, with a stem a foot 
high, and as much through, principally composed of 
its mossy roots forming a spongy mass. As an 
instance of the long life under regular treatment may 
be cited the original plant of Neottopteris Australasica, 
which was imported in 1825, and is now (1864) a 
magnificent plant, in perfect health, having received 
but few shifts the whole of the forty years. 
This is, however, far surpassed in size by the mag- 
