]
The fossils known as _Calamites_ (fig. 109) are very common in
the Carboniferous deposits, and have given occasion to an abundance
of research and speculation. They present themselves as prostrate
and flattened striated stems, or as similar uncompressed stems
growing in an erect position, and sometimes attaining a length
of twenty feet or more. Externally, the stems are longitudinally
ribbed, with transverse joints at regular intervals, these joints
giving origin to a whorl or branchlets, which mayor may not give
origin to similar whorls of smaller branchlets still. The stems,
further, were hollow, with transverse partitions at the joints,
and having neither true wood nor bark, but only a thin external
fibrous shell. There can be little doubt but that the _Calamites_
are properly regarded as colossal representatives of the little
Horse-tails (_Equisetaceoe_) of the present day. They agree with
these not only in the general details of their organisation, but
also in the fact that the fruit was a species of cone, bearing
"spore-cases" under scales. According to Principal Dawson, the
_Calamites_ "grew in dense brakes on the sandy and muddy flats,
subject to inundation, or perhaps even in water; and they had
the power of budding out from the base of the stem, so as to
form clumps of plants, and also of securing their foothold by
numerous cord-like roots proceeding from various heights on the
lower part of the stem.
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