Page:Parsons How to Know the Ferns 7th ed.djvu/102

 only instance in statute law," Dr. Eaton remarks, "where a plant has received special legal protection solely on account of its beauty."

I have never seen the plant growing, but remember that when a child my home in New York was abundantly decorated with the pressed fronds which had been brought from Hartford for the purpose. Even in that lifeless condition their grace and beauty made a deep impression on my mind.

Mr. Saunders has described it as he found it growing in company with Schizæa, in the New Jersey pine barrens:

"Lygodium palmatum is one of the loveliest of American plants, with twining stem adorned with palmate leaflets, bearing small resemblance to the popular idea of a fern. It loves the shaded, mossy banks of the quiet streams whose cool, clear, amber waters, murmuring over beds of pure white sand, are so characteristic of the pine country. There the graceful fronds are to be found, sometimes clambering a yard high over the bushes and cat-briers; sometimes trailing down the bank until their tips touch the surface of the water.

"The Lygodium is reckoned among the rare plants of the region—though often growing in good-sized patches when found at all—and is getting rarer. Many of the localities which knew it once now know it no more, both because of the