Genus Polyirkhum ; iviib fome Emendations* 67 



The leaves are generally thick, tough, and rigid, growing round 

 the (terns and branches without order, and prefling clofe or half- 

 embracing them by broad, fheathy, membranaceous bales. 



The peduncles are fmooth, ftifF, mining, erect, and for the molt 

 part arife from the fummits of the ftalks and branches, out of a cy- 

 lindrical membranaceous tube or perkha>tium, that clofely furround 

 the bafe of each. 



The capfules are of various forms, as roundilh, quadrangular, 

 and oblong; and each has a pointed lid or operculum, with a thin 

 tranfverfe central membrane underneath ; and when thefe are re- 

 moved or fallen off, the rim of the orifice appears elegantly fringed 

 with a regular row of incurved minute dents (either thirty-two 

 dents, or about double that number), which before maturity are 

 connected by their tips to the central membrane, 



The cahptra is double, one within the other ; the exterior one 

 is compofed of fhining woolly hairs, clofely matted together, and is 

 generally of a conical figure, lacerated in a loofe manner at the bafe, 

 but compact at the top, where it is clofely united to the inner one, 

 and is, for the moft part, about double its length : the interior one is 

 fmall, fubulate, fmooth, tough, and membranaceous ; but, as the 

 capfule fwelis, it burfts open on one fide from the bafe upwards for 

 half its length or more. 



Character effentlalis* 



Cap/, operculata, fubrotunda, oblonga feu quadrangula. 

 Perijl. dentatum : dentibus incurvis (32—64) apicibus memhranS 



tranfverfa adglutinatis. 

 Calypt. duplex : interior Icevis, membranacea, minuta : exterior 

 floccofa, apicibus unitis. 

 Mas difciformis, in diftincta planta. 



K 2 SPECIES. 



