on the Britifb Species of Care. 133 
Of the ufes of this tribe of plants all authors almoft are filent. 
The older botanifts declare themfelves ignorant of any good to be 
derived from them: perhaps they looked only to the fattening of 
their cattle; but here it muft be allowed, 
Nec bos pinguefcat malè carice paflus acuta. 
Linnaeus, in his F7. Lappon. adds an entertaining note to his defcrip- 
tion of C. /ylvatica, wherein he tells us, that the Laplanders comb: 
and drefs this grafs, as we do flax : when it is thus made foft, they 
ftuff their gloves and fhoes with it, to defend them from the pierc- 
ing cold of their fevere winters : fo effe&ually are they fecured by. 
this covering, that chilblains are not known amongft them. In fum- 
mer alfo: the ufe of the fame material is retained.. The Laplander,, 
unufed to every fpecies of luxury, having his fhoes made of fkins;. 
not leather, is defended by this means from the bruifes which he 
would receive: in his travels, as he tends his flocks ;. and moreover, 
efcapes the inconvenience of the heat—/udorem enim pedum arcet. It 
is not this. grafs only, but a variety of grafles are worked up in 
this manner. Lus however obferved that they. were chiefly 
Carices, and of the Carices chiefly the C. /y/vatica: 
. Mr. Lightfoot, {peaking of C. riparia, which he calls acuta, ob- 
'ferves, that “in Italy its leaves are ufed by the glafs-makers to 
bind their wine flafks, by the chair-makers to bottom chairs, and 
by the coopers to place between the junétures of the timber in the 
heads of their cafKs, in the fame manner as the leaves of the 
Typha are ufed in the fame country, and the ftalks of the Scirpus 
 dacuftris in England." FY. Scot. p. 566. 
The young foliage and the flower-ftalks of thofe: Carices which 
grow on heaths, and where there is an: abundance of cattle, are 
obferved to. be eaten off; of courfe they are not wholly without 
ufe. All Carices affeGt a very moift fituation, and of courfe, in all. 
pro- 
