128 Rhodora [July 



baud frequens", Washington, July, 1888 {Th. Holm); sandy thickets, 

 near Washington, July 22, 1896 — type (E. S. Steele): Virginia, 

 Bedford County, August 1, 1871 {A. H. Curtis;<f): Kentucky, Pine 

 Mountain, Harlan (^ounty, August, 1893 (7\ H. Kearney, Jr., no. 

 222): North Carolina, sandy ground, Swain County, July 2f), 1891 

 {Bcardslce tt- Kofoid); sandv soil, Hiltmore, June 22, 1897 (Biltmore 

 Herb. no. 2134b): (Georgia, Rome, July, 1888 {Gerald McCarthy); 

 Stone Mountain, DeKalb County, Julv 3, 1893 {J. K. Small); dry 

 woods, Athens, June 20, 1900 {R. M. Harper, no. 18). 



Resembling C. hystriciuus, but larger, with less developed root- 

 stock, harsh leaves and culms, longer spikelets, scales with prominent 

 green midribs, and longer achenes. From C. retrofracius, with which 

 it has likewise been confused, clearly sejjarated by its cylindric rather 

 than turbinate-obovoid heads, browner spikelets, smooth rays, and 

 much less developed rootstock. This is apparently the plant figured 

 in Britton & Brown's Illustrated Flora (fig. 5G7) as C. retrojraciiis. 

 The latter species which was Scirpus retrofractus L. Sp. 50 (1753) was 

 based upon a figure of Plukenet's ^ which shows clearly a coarse plant 

 with strongly turbinate heads, such as occur in a species which is well 

 known from New Jersey, to Florida and Texas, and northward in the 

 low country to Missouri. 



Cyperus FiLicuLMis Vahl, Enum. ii. 328 (1805) from Carolina 

 was described as having the spikelets 10-flowered, and the scales 

 yellowish on the sides. These characters both of color and number 

 of flowers are foiuid in Carolina sj>ecimens and in general in j)lants 

 of the southeastern states where C. filiculmis has the spikelets 1 to 1.6 

 cm. long, with 8 to 12 flowers, the scales rather thin and yellow-tinged. 

 This plant is common in the southern states but apparently rare in 

 the North where its limits seem to be Iowa, the Mohawk Valley, New 

 York, and Middlesex (^ounty, Massachusetts. The common ])lant 

 of the northern states and adjacent Canada differs in some rather 

 important regards from the typical plant of the South and it is here 

 proposed as 



C. FILICULMIS, var. macilentus, n. var. Spikelets 3 to 8 mm. long, 

 4-8-flowered : scales firm, gn'ciiish: achenes slightly smaller than in 

 the species. — Dry or sandy open soil, ISIaine to Ontario, south to 

 Virginia, Ohio, and Illinois. A common plant of which the follow- 

 ing, from among numerous specimens, are representative. Maine, 

 Orono, July 26, 1895 (M. L. Fernald, no. 343) — tyi)e: Np:w Hamp- 



' Plukcnct, Phj-t. t. 415, fig. 4 (1742). , 



