to be taking place, the supply should be withheld for a time.
A shady situation, under the influence of a temperature
proper for the individual kinds, should be selected for these
nursery pots.
When all is in readiness, the spores should be thinly
scattered over the rough surface of the sod, and the glass
cover at once put on. I t is necessary to be somewhat careful
in the act of sowing, as the spores, from their lightness and
minuteness, are liable to be dispersed in the atmosphere,
instead of being lodged on the seed-bed prepared for them;
from the same cause, they are apt to cling about the surface
of the paper— even though it be glazed—in which they may
have been enclosed. A bell-glass may be employed to cover
the soil after sowing, but we have been content to point out
the simplest means and materials by which the end in view
may be attained.
A simple and convenient contrivance for sowing the
spores, by which the progress of germination might be very
readily watched, would consist in inverting a porous flowerpot
in a shallow dish or pan of water, large enough to take
also the rim of an enclosing bell-glass, which should cover
some surface of the water. A small cup or vase, set on the
top of the inverted pot, with two or three worsted siphons.
would keep its sides always damp; the spores scattered
over the sides of this moistened porous earthenware would
find a proper nidus for their development, which might thus
be watched with great facility. It is to be borne in mind,
however, that the seedling plants are not so readily transplanted
from an earthenware or stone surface, as they are
when growing on the soil.
The general features of culture—which it wiU be sufficient
here to notice—are shade, shelter, and abundance of moisture,
neither of these being, however, essential to all the
species, but when judiciously combined producing the conditions
under which all the species admit of being very successfully
grown.
In the garden, Eerns seem only appropriately introduced
on what is called rockwork, which generally means a bank
of earth irregularly terraced with misshapen fragments of
stone, or by some other hard porous material, the vitrified
masses formed in the burning of bricks being that most
commonly substituted. With taste in the distribution of
these and such like materials, and in the planting of the
Eerns, a very pleasing effect may be produced; and on
rockwork of this kind, if it be erected in a shaded and
sheltered situation, and liberally supplied with percolating