210 ^ TRIANDRIA MONOGTYNIA. Cyperus. 
from two to six feet high, and about as thick as a stout quill, abso- 
lutely three-sided, smooth, shining, deep green.— Leaves, one, two, | 
or three at the base of each culm, and about the same length, keel- 
ed, somewhat spongy, very deep green, whitish underneath, mar- . 
. gins armed with minute, short, sharp, acicule, pointing forwards. 
—Unbel, compound and decompound. Umbellets many on smooth 
somewhat angular peduncles of various lengths, composed of from 
- five to eight cylindric, spreading spikes in a verticel, witb an erect, 
sessile, simple or pedicelled compound one in the centre.—Spikelets ' 
most numerous, imbricated, lanceolate, from eight to twelve-flower- 
ed.— Involucre many-leaved, some of them nearly as long as the 
culm, and like the radical leaves keeled and armed on the margins. 
— Involucels scarcely so long as their respective umbellets. — Scales 
of the spikelets boat-shaped, with membranaceous margins, and 
sharp thickened points c Damen three. — Seed oblong, obsoletely 
three-sided. 
Obs. This species comes near Rottboell’s Cyperus alopecuroides. 
39. C. distans. Linn. Sp. Pl. ed. Willd. 1. 988. Vahl. Enum 
. PER. 362: 
Culms about three feet high, three-cornered. Umbel qa 
with the involucre and involucels many-leaved ; spikelets linear, alter- 
nate ; flowers distant, with obtuse scales, Seeds oblong, three-sided, 
C. elatus. Rottb. gram. 37. t. 10. 
Beng. Panee-mulunga. 
Is a native of wet places around Samulcota. 
Root fibrous.—Culms erect, two feet high, four-fifths or more 
naked, three-sided, smooth ; ; angles blunt.— Leaves from two to four, 
embracing the base of the culm, and nearly as long, sheathing, deep". 
ly grooved above, and keeled below, smooth.—Umbel decompound, 
from four to six inches high. Umbellets some sessile, and from four 
to eight, with erect peduncles of unequal lengths. Partial umbel- 
letsoblong, raceme-like, being composed of alternate, needle-like, di- 
verging spikes,—4nvolucre from three to six-leaved, unequal ; the 
