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CRYPTOGAMIA Filices.
Gen. Char. Capsules axillary, solitary, of 2 valves,
naked, somewhat kidney-shaped, compressed.
S pec. Char. Leaves scattered, slightly serrated, naked-
pointed, spreading in five rows; the floral ones
short and broad. Flowering-branches annually proliferous
at the summit.
Syn. ■ Lycopodium annotinum. Linn. Sp. PL 1566.
Sm. FI. Brit. 1111, Huds. 464. With. 759
Hull. 236._ Light/. 689. FJirh. Crypt. 62.
L. elatius juniperinum, clavis singularibus, sine pedicu-
lis. D im Muse. 455. t. 63. f . 9. Rail Syn. 107.
-A. NATIVE of the Scottish and Welch mountains, but it is
the leas't general of our alpine species of Lycopodium.
The plant is perennial and evergreen, bearing fructification
in the summer. Stems creeping, leafy, rigid and tough 5
their flowering branches erect, forked, a span high, extending
themselves annually at the summit, being proliferous in the
sense used by Linnaeus in Philosophia Botanica, p. 4 0 . A
Contraction in the size of the leaves at the base of each annual
shoot, gives the whole branch a jointed appearance characteristic
of the species. The leaves are irregularly placed,
but crowded, spreading in 5 directions; their form lanceolate,
flat, obscurely serrated, sharp, but without any hair at the
point; the floral ones are dilated, shortened, membranous,
undulated, yellowish, closely imbricated, forming an obtuse
spike. Capsules kidney-shaped— Whether the whole spike
is deciduous, or whether its main stalk remains, and bears
leaves the year after flowering, we have no means of determining
without an inspection of the growing plant in autumn,
but we are inclined to believe the latter.