336 CRYPTOGAMIA— FILICES. Equisetum. 



elongated, the scales separating from each othei', disclos- 

 ing the cells, which discharge abundance of very minute 

 globular seeds. Every seed, or germen, is encompassed 

 with 4 spiral Jilavients, attached to its base, and termi- 

 nating in 4 dilated flat appendages, taken by Hedwig for 

 anthers, and producing a fine powder, or 'pollen. 

 Roots perennial, creeping. Stems herbaceous, more or less 

 branched, furrowed, tubular, jointed, with a cylindrical, 

 sharp-toothed, membranous sheath, arising from each 

 joint, and embracing a portion of the stem or branch 

 above it. Leaves none. Catkins terminal, stalked, soli- 

 tary, erect, naked, brown or blackish. Some species 

 bear them singly, on simple, radical, many-sheathed 

 shoots, soon withering away, betbre the copiously- 

 branched sterile fronds appear. In others they termi- 

 nate the proper _//-o?i(i. Several, like Grasses, secrete 

 a quantity of flinty earth, mostly lodged in their cuticle. 

 They are natives of marshy or watery situations, chiefly 

 in cold or temperate climates. Many of the older syno- 

 nyms are very obscure. 



1. E. sylvaticum. Branched Wood Horsetail. 

 Branches compound, curved downwards, smooth. 



E. sylvaticum. Lmw. Sp. PL 15 16. Willd.v.^.Z. Fl.Br.\\Q2. 



Engl. Bot.v. 27. t. 1874. HafoclTour, 15. Hook. ScoLp.2.i6L 



Bolt. Fil. 30. t. 32, 33. Fl. Dan. 1. 1182. Ehrh.Cnjpt. 161. Raii 



St/n. 130. 

 E. n. 1 680. Hall. Hist. v. 3. 3. 



E. sylvaticum, tenuissimis setis. Bauh. Theatr, 245. f. 

 E. sive Hippuris tenuissima non aspera. Bauh. Hist. v. 3. p. 2. 



723, 2./. 724. 



/3. E. sylvaticum procumbens, setis uno versa dispositis. Dili, in 

 Raii Syn. 131. 



In shady moist woods, by trickling rills, but not very frequent. 



Found chiefly in mountainous situations. By a wet dripping rock, 

 beyond Tylog^ bridge, to the left, at Hafod, Cardiganshire. 



Perennial. April, May. 



A very elegant species, twelve or eighteen inches high. Stems 

 erect, beset with many whorls of slender, compound, angular, 

 smooth (not rough) spreading branches, drooping at the ends j 

 each whorl having a pale-brown torn sheath above it. Catkin 

 solitary, terminal, erect, ovate, on a naked stalk. 



The variety (i is a very trivial one, accidentally procumbent, whence 

 the branches are all turned upwards from the ground, and be- 

 come unilateral. 



