308 
LYCOPODIACE^, 
ginosum. The colour imparted by this process, to judge from 
some cloth shown me, was a pale and pleasant, though not a 
brilliant yellow.”^ The Savin-leaved Club-Moss is a pretty 
plant, in its foliage much resembling the savin from which it 
has derived its English name : it retains throughout the winter 
a much brighter green than either of its congeners : in summer 
the young shoots have a blue tint. According to Sir W. J. 
Hooker it is the badge of the clan Macrae. 
The roots are tough, strong, wiry, and generally tortuous and 
branched ; they occur at intervals varying from two to four 
inches, and are somewhat darker in colour than those of L, cla~ 
vatum; they fix the plant firmly to the soil. 
The stem is procumbent, extending to a great length, and 
throwing up at short intervals clusters of branches, which, being 
twice or thrice dichotomously divided, give the plant a densely 
tufted appearance : the tips of the branches or divisions in each 
bunch or tuft are of nearly equal length, the extremities termi- 
nating on a level. When the plant is about to produce seed, 
spikes are thrown out from the extremities of these branches 
without any intermediate foot-stalk : the spikes are rather more 
than half an inch in length, and somewhat exceed the unfruitful 
branches in thickness, and are of a paler, yellower green colour 
than the rest of the plant : they are almost invariably in double 
pairs, plainly exhibiting the repeatedly dichotomous division of 
the branches which they terminate. 
The entire plant is covered with elongate, harsh, indistinctly 
keeled, obtusely pointed leaves ; the edges of the leaves are 
without perceptible teeth or serratures, and the points have no 
acute or filamentous termination ; the leaves or bracts in the 
spike are membranous, flat, scale-like, serrated at the sides, di- 
lated at the base, and terminating in a prolonged point at the 
apex. After the escape of the seeds the spikes bend down- 
wards, assuming a semicircular form, and the bracts become 
reflexed. The capsules are sessile, of a pale yellow colour, and 
in form much resembling a kidney bean. 
* Journal of a Tour in Iceland, in the year 1809, i. 214. Wadmal is the 
name of the woollen cloth usually worn hy the Icelanders. 
