182 ';;(• ' • ' ' Rhodora '/' '' ' [September 



North Carolina, Colorado and Oregon. C. Harperi, on the other 

 hand, is a plant of the southern coastal plain, which may be expected 

 to extend along the coast or in the Mississippi Basin considerably 

 north of its present known range. Its chief points of distinction, 

 already enumerated, may be contrasted with those of C. leptaka as 

 follows: the perigynia oiC. llarpcri art' 4 to o mm. long and strongly 

 overlapping, those of C. lepfalea 2.5 to 3.5 mm. long and subalternate; 

 the scales of C. Ilarpcri are whitish and acuminate, those of C. lepfalea 

 brownish and mostly obtuse or obtusish; the achenes of C. Ilarpcri 

 puncticulate, barely lustrous, and sharply angled, those of C leptaka 

 lustrous, not puncticulate, and obtusely angled. 



Carex virescens Muhl. "in lit." was published almost simul- 

 taneously and with essentially identical descriptions by WilUlenow ^ 

 and by Schkuhr,^ each citing the other's publication. From their 

 descriptions "spica androgyna lineari pedunculata inferne mascula, 

 femineis subapproxiinatis binis subpedunculatis linearibus, .... 

 fructibus globoso-triquetris obtusis pubescentibus .... Capsulae 

 maturae virides subnervosae pubescentes," and from the detailed draw- 

 ing of the plant in Schkuhr's work there is no question of the ])lant 

 Muhlenberg had in hand. 



There are two extreme variations of Carex virescens. One has 2 

 to 4 linear-cylindric spikes, 2 to 4 mm. thick, the terminal one (includ- 

 ing the staminate base) 1 .8 to 4 cm. long, and from ^V to ^ as thick. The 

 other has 2 to 5 oblong-cylindric to subglobose spikes 3 to 5 mm. 

 thick, the terminal one 9 to 1<S mm. long and from I to J as thick. The 

 perigynia of the slender-spiked jilant are somewhat costate, of the 

 thicker s{)iked plant less so, or nearly nerveless. These two plants 

 are ordinarily well mai'ked but numerous transitional specimens show 

 them to be varieties of one species, and they are usually so treated 

 though by some authors they are accepted as distinct species: the 

 shorter- and thicker-spiked plant as C. virescens, the longer- and slen- 

 der-spiked jilant as var. cosfafa Dewey (C. cosiellaia Britton). With 

 the exception of Dewey, the earlier students of American Carices — 

 Torrey, Carey, Boott, and others — made no strong distinction be- 

 tween the plants, though Boott, in his Illustrations, recognized the 



» Wind. Sp. iv. 25t (1805). 



^Schkuhr, Riedgr. Nachtr. 45, t. Mmm. fig. 147 (1806). 



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