As a followup to aquarium's post, here's an example that uses a simple print and Dumper:

#!/usr/bin/perl

use Net::FTP;
use Data::Dumper::Concise;

use constant HOST  => 'ftp.cpan.org';
use constant DIR1  => '/pub/CPAN/authors';

my $ftp = Net::FTP->new(
    HOST, 
    Debug => 1, 
    Passive => 1, 
    Timeout => 1
);

$ftp->login('anonymous');
$ftp->cwd(DIR1);
print Dumper $ftp->dir(<DIR1>);
$ftp->quit;
[download]

Note: The list of authors isn't current because its not maintained anymore. I only use it for examples. Update: Or you could use a glob and ls:

#!/usr/bin/perl

use Net::FTP;
use Data::Dumper::Concise;

use constant HOST  => 'ftp.cpan.org';
use constant DIR1  => '/pub/CPAN/authors';
use constant GLOB  => '*.???';

my $ftp = Net::FTP->new(
    HOST, 
    Debug => 1, 
    Passive => 1, 
    Timeout => 1
);

$ftp->login('anonymous');
$ftp->cwd(DIR1);
print Dumper $ftp->ls(<GLOB>);
$ftp->quit;
[download]