2777
EQUISETUM Drummondii.
Blunt-topped Horse-tail.
CR YPTOGAMIA Equisetacece.
Gen. Char. Fructifications terminal, in spikes or
catkins, consisting of peltate, polygonous scales,
on the underside of which are from 4 to 7 involucres,
which open longitudinally and contain numerous
globose bodies (capsules?), enfolded by
4 filaments, clubbed at their extremities, (which
some take for stamens).
Spec. Chau. Frond very obtuse at the extremity.
Sterile stem (especially upwards,) scabrous with
prominent points, and with about 20 striae; teeth
of the sheath appressed. Branches simple, patent.
Fertile stem without branches; its sheaths approximate,
appressed, with subulate teeth.
S y n . Equisetum Drummondii. Hook. Brit. FI.
ed. 2. 451.
F o r this addition to the species of Equisetum we are
indebted to Mr. Thomas Drummond, who found it on the
banks of the Isla and Esk in Forfarshire, extending up the
valleys almost to the sources of those rivers. The flowering
stems, which appear before the sterile ones, are in
perfection in April. Its nearest affinity is doubtless with
E . arcense {Engl. Bot. t. 2020.), but it is abundantly distinct.
Its colour is greener and less glaucous, its stems rougher
with closely set raised points, its angles and branches much
more numerous ; and the whole barren frond is singularly
blunt in its outline, or circumscription, at the extremity,
by which it may be at once known from E. arvense. The