Page:Parsons How to Know the Ferns 7th ed.djvu/152



Where the water is pouring forever she sits, And beside her the Ouzel, the Kingfisher flits; There, supreme in her beauty, beside the full urn, In the shade of the rock stands the tall Lady Fern.

Noon burns up the mountain; but here by the fall The Lady Fern flourishes graceful and tall. Hours speed as thoughts rise, without any concern, And float like the spray gliding past the green Fern."

The Silvery Spleenwort grows in company with its kinsman, the Narrow-leaved Spleenwort, and also with many of the Aspidiums, such as the Spinulose Shield Fern, the Evergreen Wood Fern, the Christmas and Goldie's Fern. I find it growing in large patches in the rich woods, often near water, either in boggy ground or on the very edge of the clear, brown brook. Sometimes it is difficult to detect a single fertile frond in a group of plants covering many square feet of ground. This is probably owing