104 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
JTne 10. 
Thus all purses aud all situations — if neither tho 
one nor the other are absolutely barren—can command 
a supply of Ferns; and as we have had many enquiries 
relative to those within the reach of the many, we 
purpose publishing a series of drawings and notes of 
and about 
HARDY FERNS. 
Our notes will not be a mass of dry technical terms, 
which only the palate of a mere botanical collector can 
relish, but will be a mingling of what we think will be 
interesting to ail, whether derived from our own obser¬ 
vations, or from the observations of others. Moreover, 
we shall endeavour to use terms which all can under¬ 
stand; for our object, especially, is to benefit and 
gratify those who love plain truths in plain words. 
Ferns are flowerless plants with stems, yet in this 
country the leaves are far more strikingly developed 
than are the stems. 
“ In our Ferns,” says Mr. Henfrey, “ the stem is 
indeed occasionally erect, rising a few inches from the 
ground, and expanding its wide leaves (or fronds, as 
they are usually called) in a circle ; but in a greater 
number it creeps along beneath the ground, being, in 
fact, a rhizome similar in the nature of its growth to 
that of the Sedges, and other flowering-plants. This 
rhizome bears small separate (adventitious) root3on the 
under side, while at intervals from the upper spring 
leaves, which, when young, are very pretty objects, 
being curled up in a kind of scroll, that gradually 
unrolls as they rise upward. The bodies which re¬ 
present the seeds here (called spores) are visually pro¬ 
duced in formations growing upon the backs of the 
leaves, and it is principally upon the mode of arrange¬ 
ment of these formations (called sori ) that the classi¬ 
fication of Ferns is founded. 
“ The common condition of the apparatus in which 
the spores are produced, may be described as follows:— 
On the backs of the leaves, round patches, or streaks, 
or lines running round the borders of the divisions, 
appear, which in a perfect state have a brown, powdery 
aspect. This appearance is concealed in many kinds, 
in the early stages, by a membranous cover enclosing 
the brown dust; when the spores are more advanced, 
these coverings (called indusia) become either wholly 
or partly detached, and if examined with a magnifying 
glass, are found to have peculiar forms in different kinds 
of Ferns, and to be attached sometimes by little stalks, 
and sometimes by their edges. If we place some of the 
brown dust-like substance under a microscope, we find 
it to consist of a number of little cases, which, when 
ripe, burst, and discharge the very minute spores which 
have been produced within them. The bursting of 
the cases results from the elasticity of a kind of thick¬ 
ened band (the annulus), which extends around tho 
membranous case, or spore-fruit (tlicca). The spores 
are mostly so small ns to be invisible singly, to the 
naked eye, and consist of single vesicles of various 
shapes, often beautifully ornamented with markings on 
the exterior. 
I “ Some Ferns bear their spore-fruits in a somewhat 
different way. In the Osmunda, or Royal Fern, the 
division forming the end of the leaf consists of a spike 
covered with capsules (spore-fruits), which differ slightly 
from those above described. In the Adder’s-tongue 
and Moonwort, the spores are produced in fronds 
(called fertile fronds), which are quite changed in 
character for this purpose, and appear like spiked in¬ 
florescences. These three last kinds are sometimes 
wrongly called Flowering Ferns. 
“ In germination, the spore, which is a mere vesicle 
and not a miniature plant, such as we find in a seed, 
grows and divides into a number of vesicles, which 
multiply and enlarge until they form a minute green, 
leaf-like patch, and from the surface of this the first 
leaf arises, as it does from tli eplimnde, or terminal bud 
of the embryo in the flowering-plants.” 
“ The root of the tribe of Ferns,” observes Mr. Keith, 
“ assumes a great variety of different aspects in different 
species. In Botrychium Lunaria it is fibrous; in 
Aspidium dilatatum it is tuberous; and in Polypodium 
vulgare it is creeping and covered with scales. In Pteris 
aquilina, or Common Brakes, it is sometimes described 
* as being spindle-shaped : yet this is not strictly the fact. 
If a frond is taken and pulled up with the hand, the 
j jvortion of it is indeed spindle-shaped; but the real root, 
' or rather rhizoma, or root-stock, from which you have 
1 thus detached the frond, remains still in the soil, 
| elongating in a horizontal direction at the depth of 
I from three to four inches, sometimes simple and some- 
; times branched, but always furnished with lateral fibres. 
“ The trunk of Ferns—if trunk ‘ it can be called 
which trunk is none ’—is a stipe supporting the frond; 
or rather the whole of the herbage is a frond —that is, an 
incorporation of stipe (or stem), leaf, and fructification. 
If the stipe of a Fern is cut open, it will be found to 
consist of a firm pulp or pith, interspersed with buudles 
of longitudinal fibres of a dusty brown colour, assuming 
an arrangement proper to the species. On a transverse 
section of the stipe of Pteris aquilina (Common Brake), 
| taken a little above the surface of the soil, the divided 
i extremities of the bundles exhibit a slight resemblance 
to an oak-tree in full leaf. This has been noticed even 
by the peasantry of the country, among whom it is 
known by the name of ‘ King Charles’s Oak.’ But if the 
section, is taken in a slanting direction, then the re- 
| semblance exhibited is that of the Eagle of the Romau 
j standard ; whence we have the trivial name. 
It was for a long time believed that Ferns are 
destitute of seeds, and propagated nobody knows how. 
Yet no botanist of the present day doubts the reality of 
Fern-seed, or at the least of sporules from which new 
plants spring. Some have even fancied that they had 
detected the parts of tho antecedent flower. But ad¬ 
mitting that such detection is impracticable, the botanist 
can, at least, direct his attention to the mode of fructifi¬ 
cation, and to the fruit produced. In Ferns, strictly so 
called, it is dorsal,—that is, scattered in clusters or 
patches on the baek of the frond. These patches are 
generally accompanied with an integument called the 
