The ferns of Britain, and their allies. Comprising Equisetaceae, Filicaceae, Lycopodiaceae, marsileaceae. Forming the fourth volume of Florigraphia Britannica / by Richard Deakin.
- Deakin, Richard, 1808-1873.
- Date:
- 1848
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: The ferns of Britain, and their allies. Comprising Equisetaceae, Filicaceae, Lycopodiaceae, marsileaceae. Forming the fourth volume of Florigraphia Britannica / by Richard Deakin. Source: Wellcome Collection.
19/200 page 13
![GENUS. EQUISETUM.—Linn. Horsetail. Gen. Char. Fructification terminal, in cone-like spikes or catkins consisting of peltate scales, on the underside of which are from four to seven involucres, which open longitudinally, and contain numerous globose bodies, enfolded by four filaments, club-shaped at their extremity, and highly hygrometrical.—[Rigid leafless branched plants, with striated fistulous stems and branches, in the cuticle of which silex is secreted, numerously jointed, with sheathing toothed articulations.] 1. Fertile stems simple, succulent; barren stems with whorled branches. 1. E. Telmateia, Ehrh. (Fig. 1567.) Great mud Horsetail. Fertile stem simple, terminating in an obtuse spike, the sheaths numerous, large, funnel-shaped, with about twenty ribs, each rib terminating in as many subulate teeth; sterile stems smooth, bearing numerous whorls of nearly erect simple unequally octagonal rough branches, the alternate furrow widest, their sheaths four toothed. Newman’s British Ferns, p. 67.—E. fluviatile.—English Botany, t. 2022. —English Flora, vol. iv. p. 324.—Hooker, British Flora, ed. 4. vol. i. p. 393. Root slender, fibrous, in whorls from the joints, the underground stems long, deep black, spreading. The stems are of three kinds. 1. simple, unbranched, bearing only a spike; 2. bearing spike and whorls of branches ; 3. bearing whorls of branches only. The fertile stem is erect, simple, from nine to fifteen inches long, round, smooth, succulent, pale brown, more or less numerously jointed, and from each joint arises a large sheath, loose, funnel shaped, especially the upper ones; the lower half of the sheath is a pale greenish brown, the upper part brown, membranous, striated with the numerous green ribs, which terminate in the slender subulate teeth, the catkin is from two to three inches long, and from one to one and half inches in cir- cumference in its thickest part, the scales are very numerous, and arranged in* whorls, the lower ones usually indistinct separate whorls, the rest closely crowded. Barren stems erect, often attaining the height of seven feet, and nearly two inches in circumference, though, the usual size is about five feet, and an inch in circumference about its middle, but thicker below, and very slender at the top, quite](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b2933133x_0019.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
