HORSETAILS 175 
grows, too, in Prussia and Switzerland, as well as in North America and 
Northern Asia. It is found at a greater altitude than any other species. It 
is plentiful in the Highlands of Scotland and in the north of Ireland, and 
also in several parts of Yorkshire and other northern counties ; and is found 
occasionally in some southern localities, as on Apse Heath, Isle of Wight, 
and at times in Kent, Surrey, Sussex, Devonshire, and other counties. 
Mr. Newman mentions that it grows in the Hampstead and Highgate woods. 
and says that it is remarkable that it was seen there as long since as the time 
of Lobel. He adds: “In Scotland I observed it growing with peculiar 
luxuriance in the vicinity of Loch Tyne, in a little fir-wood on a hill-side. 
The fructification had entirely disappeared, and each stem had attained its 
full development, and every pendulous branch its full length and elegance. 
Altogether I could have fancied it a magic scene, created by the fairies for 
their especial use and pleasure. It was a forest in miniature, and a forest of 
surpassing beauty. It is impossible to give an idea of such a scene, either 
by language or illustration.” Sir William Hooker likened such a group to a 
miniature grove of larches. 
The brown creeping stem of the Wood Horsetail is branched, and is tufted 
with fibrous roots. This plant has two kinds of fronds; they have both 
erect stems; and both, when fully grown, are surrounded by compound 
branches, though these are fewer on the fertile than on the barren stem. The 
fertile stems are at first quite without branches, but these soon develop them- 
selves, and are generally from six to eight number. The stem is from half 
a foot to two feet in height, of.a dull faded-looking green colour, succulent, 
and having from ten to eighteen slender ridges, with corresponding furrows. 
It is not so rough nor so firm as in most of the species, on account of the 
extreme minuteness of the flinty particles in the cuticle. The margins of 
the sheaths are cut into three or four lobes, and the sheaths are large and 
loose ; the lower half are pale green, and the lobes of a bright brown colour, 
and they are marked with the same number of ribs as the stem. The whorled 
branches are slender, about two inches long, curving downwards; and a 
marked feature of this species is, that these branches have other branches 
growing at their joints. These secondary branches are from half an inch to 
an inch long. The cone, which is matured in April, is long, somewhat taper- 
ing, and of a pale brown colour, standing on a slender stalk longer than 
itself. The scales are more than eighty in number, and when ripened 
disperse a great number of pale greenish-coloured spores. The cone dies away 
long before the stem or branches have begun to wither, but it is rarely seen, 
for this species does not often bear fruit. . 
The barren stems, which are of a much less succulent nature than the 
fertile ones, are taller and more slender, and bear more branches; their 
sheaths, too, though similar, are smaller, and fit the stem more closely, and 
their ribs are more strongly marked. The compound branches are often 
crowded on the stem, the side branches being about four inches long, and 
bearing at every joint a whorl of branches about half that length. Some- 
times these are again branched, and drooping down in whorl beyond whorl, 
the frond becomes exceedingly elegant, narrowing upwards to a slender point, 
which droops too with the weight of lengthening branchlets. The terminal 
