64 
Rustic Adornments, 
adiantums and others that are susceptible of injury through the application 
of water overhead must take their chance. A very small shower goes a 
great way, and therefore the cultivator will soon learn to be cautious and 
moderate. 
One more remark on this subject must be made. Cold water, that is, river 
and rain water, as it comes to hand, may be used from May to August, but 
from September to April the water should be tepid. This is a matter of great 
importance, as will be seen by those who take a real and constant interest in 
fireside fern-culture. 
Under the best of management accidents will happen. One of the most 
likely, and one from which the most experienced cannot be entirely secured, 
is an accumulation of an excess of water in the soil. It is a common defect 
of fern-cases, that they allow no escape for the excess of moisture, but there 
ought in every instance to be some provision to render it impossible for the 
soil to become water-logged. But how will you know when the dreadful 
event has occurred ? The ferns will tell you in unmistakeable language, for 
fronds that should be green will become yellow; there will be patches of decay 
and some of the more-delicate-habited species will cease to throw up fronds, 
and if examined will be found to be decaying in the centre. The safest 
remedy is to take the whole affair to pieces, remove the sour soil, and 
begin afresh. Lay down a good bed of broken flower-pots, or large 
cinders, or broken charcoal; then put on a thin layer of moss, or the 
coarsest cocoa-nut fibre refuse, and finish with a bed of the proper soil, 
piling it up as much as may be consistent with good taste, but to increase 
the depth for the plants, and to raise them as much as possible above 
the drainage. 
Insects rarely prey on ferns, but they will appear occasionally. In spring, 
the tender rising fronds may be beset with green aphis, and in summer the 
more injurious thrips will perhaps appear. Judicious ventilation and watering 
are the best preventives, but onced lodged, the eradication of these insects is 
not an easy matter. To fill the case with tobacco smoke until not a leaf can 
be seen, and keep it closely shut and every crevice covered with a damp cloth 
for several hours, will certainly make an end of the vermin, but then it is the 
very thing that in the majority of instances cannot be done. The next best 
nostrum is the vapour of turpentine. Place a little spirits of turpentine in an 
open vessel which can be kept warm for an hour or two, and shut it up in the 
case for six hours. A simple mode of creating a turpentine vapour is to fix 
