rilJCE?!. 93 



sryaviej:. 



Jfot.i/'K proper. Ctipmcle sessile or pedicelled, indehiscent, or icith a separable opereit- 

 liou. JIuat/i with or without an annidus, naked, or with a simple or double jteristoine. 



Orikr CHAllACEJ-:. 



A(juatic branclifd plant:!, with wliorlcd brandies, consisting of a series of lona; 

 siiperimiiosed faseieli-s of inarticulate tribes. Aiitlieridia consisting of spherical 

 vesicles containing articuhitc tubes, each joint (cell) of wbicli contains an antherozoid. 

 Archegonia consisting of a single spore, covered with spirally arranged tubes, and 

 fertilized in situ. 



Order FILICALES. 



Plants with both cellular and vascular tissue. Antkeridia or archcf/onia, or 



both, formed on a, protludtus that is developed from the spore on its germination. 



a. Spores of two kinds, one containing aitlherozoids, the other developing a 

 j.rothallus, -with archegonia. 



IS0ETE.15. 

 Submerged or teiTestrial plants, with a tumid caudex, clothed with the 

 sheatliiug bases of elongated fronds. Sporangia enclosed in the bases of the fronds, 

 those of the outer frond bearing maerospores, of the inner, microspores. In gi'riui- 

 nating, the maerospores produces a j^rothallus bearing archegonia. 



Order LYCOPODIACE^. 



Stem simple or branched, erect, prostrate, pendulous, or sometimes with a 

 creeping rhizome, covered with small uniform or bifonu leaves, rarely leafless. 

 Sporangia solitary, placed at the base of the leaves, or in the scales of terminal 

 cones bi- or trivalved, containing either quaternary microspores full of antherozoids, 

 or sub-globose maerospores, with a tricrural mark on one hemisphere, and developing 

 on germination a prothallus, which produces archegonia. 



The uses to man of the Lycopodiacem are few and unimportant. The dust filling 

 the sporangia of some species is called, from its inflammability, vegetable sulphur, 

 and is used to produce theatrical lightning, and also as a desiccator, or substitute for 

 violet powder, to mitigate and prevent excoriation of the skin of infants. Medical 

 properties arc attributed to some, but they do not deserve enumeration. 



Order SALYIXE.E. 



Fronds floating ; margins recurved in vernation. Sporangia and anfhcridia 

 contained in separate capsules produced at the base of the fronds. Prothallm pro- 

 ducing a single archegonium. 



Order MAESILIACEJ^l. 



Fronds slender, from a creeping rhizome, simple and filiform, or with four 

 terminal wedge-shaped leaflets, circinatc in vernation. Sporangia and antheridia 

 together, contained in coriaceous globose capsules, produced on the rhizome. 

 Prothallus as in Salvineee. 



h. Spores of one kind. Antheridia and archegonia both produced upon a 

 prothallus. 



Order EQUISETACE^. 



Pylindric, jointed, leafless plants, with hollow intemodes, terminated by 

 a toothed sheath. Fructification a cone of peltate scales, which bear on their under- 

 surface several dehiscent sporangia. Spores furnished with two filaments that are 

 at iii-st coiled round them. Prothallus unisexual. 



