COMMON CLUB-MOSS. 355 
It seems rather unaccountable that neither Gerarde, nor his 
able editor, Johnson, to whom, by the way, the great herbalist 
is indebted for the better half of his fame, should have so en- 
tirely overlooked the minute but multitudinous seeds, which have 
attracted the attention of so many other botanists. Olearius 
appears to have been the first to mention these seeds, and a 
curious purpose to which they have been applied. This author 
devotes the 24th chapter of the 4th book of his Itinerary, to the 
fire-works of Ardebil, a town in Persia ; and he believes them 
produced by the seeds of this Lycopodium. He observes, ‘‘We 
saw at a distance some flames rise suddenly in the air, and as 
suddenly disappear, and we supposed them to be produced by 
the Russian Plaun, which is much used for this purpose. The 
plauuy to explain more fully, is nothing more than a yellow dust 
which is beaten out of the Muscus terrestris. The moss is 
called in herbals heerlap* or DeviVs-claw, and grows commonly 
in fir and birch woods, and also on waste lands : I have fre- 
quently met with it in the Russian and Livonian woods. It 
throws out twin cones, which, when ripe in August, are collected 
in large quantities and dried in furnaces ; the powder is then 
beaten out and sold by the pound. I bought several ox-blad- 
ders full, and brought them home with me. Its other uses are 
in green wounds, recent bruises, and for chafed children, inas- 
much as it is of a drying and healing nature ; and it is more- 
over used by the Russians in the Chaldaic fire above spoken of. 
The powder is placed in a tin case, of elongate conical form, 
about half an ell in length, or sometimes shorter ; this is taken 
in the hand, and a burning light or torch is placed at the aper- 
ture ; the case is then waved about in the air, so that the plaun 
flowLS through the aperture, and then ignites, producing a bright 
flame : when the motion is rapidly repeated, so that one flame 
follows another, it produces a very extraordinary effect. Fine 
fun may be made in company, if a tobacco-pipe be secretly 
filled with this plaun, and held to the light and blown into ; a 
strong flame, suddenly and unexpectedly to those sitting around, 
proceeds from it, and that it may produce a great noise they mix 
Tragus figures the plant under this name. 
2 a2 
