OUR NATIVE FERNS AND THEIR ALLIES. CHAPTER I. HAUNTS AND HABITS OF FERNS. OUf outward life requires them not,Then wherefore had they birth? To minister delight to man, To beautify the earth. -MARY HOWI1". 1. Cenerat Char-acter-s.-Our native ferns comprise plants varying in height from less than an inch to six or scven feet, or even more. Some are stout and fleshy, others are delicate and even filmy, but most are herbaceous. resembling ordinary flowering plants in the texture of their foliage. While most would be recognized as ferns by even a novice, a few differ so widely from the ordinary typical forms that to an unskilled observer they would scarcely be considered as bearing any resemblance to ferns whatever. Thc fronds of one of our Florida species resemble narrow blades of grass, and the fertile spikes of another from New Jersey might be mistaken for a diminutive species of sedge. A third from Alabama would, perhaps, be called a moss by the inexperienced, whileTable of Contents...