Page:Parsons How to Know the Ferns 7th ed.djvu/150

 plant is very graceful and pleasing. When growing in shaded places it is often conspicuous by reason of its bright pink or reddish stalks, which contrast effectively with the delicate green of the foliage. But in later summer, judging by my own experience, the Lady Fern loses much of its delicacy. Many of its fronds become disfigured and present a rather blotched and coarse appearance.

This seems strange in view of the fact that the plant is called by Lowe, a well-known English writer, the "Queen of Ferns," and that it is one of the few ferns to which we find reference in literature. Scott pays it the compliment, rarely bestowed upon ferns, of mentioning it by name :

In English works devoted to ferns I find at least two poems, more remarkable for enthusiasm than for poetic inspiration, in its honor. I quote a portion of the one which occurs in Miss Pratt's "Ferns of Great Britain and Their Allies":

But seek her not in early May,
 * For a Sibyl then she looks.

With wrinkled fronds that seem to say,
 * 'Shut up are my wizard books!'

Then search for her in the summer woods,
 * Where rills keep moist the ground,

Where Foxgloves from their spotted hoods.
 * Shake pilfering insects round;