Page:Parsons How to Know the Ferns 7th ed.djvu/240



The Smooth Woodsia closely resembles the Northern Woodsia, and one may expect to find it in much the same parts of the country. In texture it is still more delicate; its fronds are almost perfectly smooth, its outline is narrower, and its pinnæ are but slightly lobed.

Mr. Pringle tells us that a letter from Mr. George Davenport, asking him to look for Woodsia glabella, awakened his first interest in ferns. His own account of these early fern hunts is inspiring in its enthusiasm:

"In 1873 George Davenport was beginning his study of ferns. A letter from him, asking me to look for Woodsia glabella . . . started me on a fern hunt. The species had been found on Willoughby Mountain, Vt., and at Little Falls, N. Y.; might it not be growing in many places in Vermont? When I set out I knew, as I must suppose, not a single fern, and it was near the close of the summer. You can imagine what delights awaited me in the autumn woodlands. I made the acquaintance of not a few ferns, though it was too late to prepare good specimens of them. In this first blind endeavor I got, of