FERN LAND. 
CHAPTER I. 
INTRODU CTION. 
the pure air which, with its 
■ 1 .. 
buoyant and life-giving power, 
roams in sweetness and freedom 
over mountain and plain, hill¬ 
side, meadow, and stream, and 
wherever the rich gifts of Nature, 
far away from the habitations of man, 
abound in spontaneous luxuriance. Given 
the sight of a river as it rolls through 
the valley from its mountain home, fresh 
from dews and vapours, unsullied by contact with 
towns and cities; or of a streamlet whose smaller 
volume winds its silvery thread through the 
moorland. Given the sight and sound of a 
gurgling brook, as it babbles and sparkles over 
