Till the plants are above two years of age, they are liable to die from drought or the attacks of ants, and during 1878 many thousands died from these causes. At the end of the fourth year some proprietors begin to collect the quill bark by the method of coppicing. It is feared by some that, should this new venture be successful, it will prove a dangerous rival to the plantations of India, Ceylon, and Java, and lower the price of bark considerably.--_Jour. Society of Arts_. * * * * * FERNS. _N. Davallioides Furcans._--Among the many crested ferns in cultivation, this, of which the annexed is an illustration, is one of the most distinct; so different indeed it is from the type, that it is questionable if it really is a form of it; the most essential characteristic, that of the fructification at the extreme edge of the lobes of the pinnæ, is altogether absent, and the whole habit of the plant is also thoroughly distinct. It is of equally robust growth, but its handsomely arching fronds, which are from 3 feet to 4 feet in length, are produced in great abundance from a central tuft or agglomeration of crowns. Its most distinct characteristic is the furcation of the pinnæ, which are all of the same dimensions, whether sterile or fertile; they are all opposite and closely set along the mid-rib, whereas those of N. davallioides are set much further apart. In the barren pinnæ which are only situated on the lower portion of the frond, and which generally are only few in number, the furcation is rudimentary; in the fertile pinnæ it is twice and even three times repeated in the extremities of the first division, becoming more complex toward the point of the frond, where it often forms quite a large tassel, whose weight gives the fronds quite an elegant, arching habit. On that account this plant is valuable for growing in baskets of large dimensions, in which it shows itself off to good advantage, and never fails to prove attractive. Although it produces spores freely, it is best to propagate it by means of the young plants produced from rhizomes in the ordinary way, on account of the extreme variations which take place among the seedlings, a small percentage only of which are possessed of the true character of the parent plant. Stove.--_The Garden._ [Illustration: NEPHROLEPIS DAVALLIOIDES FURCANS.]