364 



EQTJISETACE^E — CALAMITES. 



[Ch. XXIV. 



dron ; indeed, it is not uncommon in Coalbrook Dale, and elsewhere, to 

 find these strobili or fruits terminating the tip of a branch of a well char 

 acterized I/epidodendron. 



Equisetacece. — To this family belong two fossil species of the Coal * 

 one called Equisetum infundibuliforme by Brongniart, and found also in 

 Nova Scotia, which has sheaths, regularly toothed, ribbed, and overlap- 

 ping like those on the young fertile stems of Equisetum Jiuviatile. It 

 was much larger than any living "Horsetail." The Equisetum giganteum, 

 discovered by Humboldt and Bonpland in South America, attained a 

 height of about 5 feet, the stem being an inch in diameter ; but more 

 recently Gardner has met with one in Brazil 15 feet high, and Meyen 

 gives the height of E. Bogotense in Chili as 15 to 20 feet. 



Calamites. — The fossil plants, so called, were originally classed by 

 most botanists as cryptogamous, being regarded as gigantic Equiseta ; 



Fig. 475. 



Fig. 476. 



Calamites cannaformis, Schlot 

 (Foss. Flo. 79.) Common in 

 English coal. 



alamite.s Suckoieii, Brong. ; 

 natural size. Common in 

 coal throughout Europe. 



Fig. 477. 



for, like the common " horsetail," they usually exhibit 

 little more than hollow jointed stems, furrowed ex- 

 ternally. (See figs. 475, 476, 477.) 



Mr. Salter stated to me, many years ago, his con- 

 viction that the calamite, as frequently represented 

 by paleontologists, was in an inverted position, and 

 that the conical part given as the top of the stem was 

 in truth the root. This point Mr. Dawson and I had 

 opportunities of testing in Nova Scotia, where we saw 

 many erect calamites, having their radical termination 

 as in the annexed figure (fig. 477). The scars, from 

 which whorls of vessels have proceeded, are observed 

 at the upper, not the lower end of each joint or inter- 

 node.* The specimen, fig. 475, therefore, is no doubt 



Radical termination of , . . - . , , x . ,, . 



a Calamite. Nova the lower end of the plant, and 1 have therefore re- 

 versed its position as given in the work of Lindley 

 and Hutton. 

 M. Adolphe Brongniart, following up the discoveries of Germar and 

 Corda, has shown in his " Genres de Vegetaux Fossiles," 1849, that many 



* See Dawson, GeoL Quart. Journal, 185-1, vol. x. p. 35. 



