REPORT OX THE BOTAXY OF TIIE ISLAXDS OF THE SOUTHERX OCEAX. 157 



This variety, if it even deserve that rank, is dwarf and densely tufted, and the thick 

 glumes are more distinctly two-coloured — green and brown — than in any other ; other- 

 wise it presents no tangible differences. A comparison of the analysis of the infloresence 

 of this with those of the other forms figured, teaches how very closely allied they all are. 

 In all of them the glumes are rather thick, and in some of them, especially the proliferous 

 conditions, they are almost fleshy. The lowermost one is more or less strongly two-ribbed 

 longitudinally. The number of stamens and even sticrmas is inconstant in the same 

 spikelet, and therefore of no value whatever for distinguishing the different forms. The 

 floral organs, indeed, seem to be usually in an abnormal condition, owing perhaps to the 

 great tendency to prolification ; and the plant seems to propagate itself vegetatively rather 

 than sexually. Among the copious specimens collected by Mr Moseley, as well as those 

 of previous collectors, we have not found one perfect nut. In this variety the number 

 of stamens varies from one to three in the same spikelets, the number usually being less 

 than three. With only two or three of the forms before us, we thought the characters 

 afforded by the leaves would serve to distinguish them ; but an examination of the whole 

 series reveals a gradual transition from bladeless sheaths to leaves nearly as long as the 

 culms. In this the relatively broad obtuse blade is longer than the sheath and sometimes 

 as long as the culms. The dwarf, densely tufted specimens in Mr Moseley's collection, 

 which Boeckeler named " Scirjius hicolor," and which are as near typical Scirpus bicolor as 

 any that we have seen, yet as different from it as some of the so-called species are from each 

 other, have very broad and thick leaves, sometimes longer and sometimes shorter than the 

 culms. All of them, too, exhibit a decided tendency to prolification, though it is never 

 developed in so marked a degree as in some of the other forms. The whole plant, or 

 growths, for some of the culms develop several successive tufts of leaves and branches one 

 above the other, varies from one inch to three or four inches in height, and the inflorescence 

 varies from one or two small spikelets to a very dense globose head composed of very 

 numerous spikelets. 



Scirpus thouarsianus, Schult, var. virens, Hemsl. (Plate XXXIII., figs. 7-12.) 



Scirpus thouarsianus, Schult., var. virens, Hemsl. 

 Scirpus virens, Bceckeler in Flora, 1875, p. 261 (species). 



Inaccessible and Nightingale Islands. — Endemic. Moseley. 



Bceckeler describes the leaves as somewhat acute, the spikelets as 7-3 together and 

 20-12-flowered, the stamens as two in number, and the nut as exceedingly minute, &c. 

 The plants are six to eight inches high, and slenderer than Scirj"'s i>nUescens, represented 

 on the same plate in figs. 1-6 as Sciiyms virens ; the leaves are much shorter than the 

 culms, though the blade is longer than the sheath, and rather more obtuse than in 

 figure 7. The culms are, many of them, perhaps half of them, quite barren ; others bear 

 one, two, or three, few-flowered spikelets, and the remainder more and larger spikelets up 



