EQUTSETUM. 
259 
This plant is not, as far as we are aware, applied to any 
use ; and the harshness of its stems renders it by no means 
agreeable to cattle, although it often occurs abundantly 
among their pasturage ; and in cultivated ground becomes 
a troublesome weed. 
Equisetum sylvaticum, Linnwus. 
The Wood Horsetail. {Plate XX. fig. 3.) 
Perhaps this may be called the most beautiful of the 
Equisetums ; certainly it is extremely elegant in almost 
all stages of its growth, and perhaps never more so than 
shortly after the fertile stems, with their fructification still 
perfect, have begun to develop their lateral branches. 
Later in the season, these branches, which have from the 
first a pendent tendency, droop around with exquisite 
grace on all sides. 
The creeping underground stem of the Wood Horsetail 
is, like that of the others, dark-coloured and branched, 
and produces from its joints the slender fibrous roots which 
draw up nourishment to the plant. The aboveground 
stems are erect, and, in a certain sense, those of them 
which produce fructification, and those which are barren, 
are similar, except as regards this one point. Their 
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