H TRANSACTIONS OF THE [fEB. 22, 



February 22, 1892. 



Annual Meeting. 



Fifteen persons present. 



In the absence of the regular officers, Prof. Rees was chosen to 

 preside. 



The minutes of February 15th were read and approved. 



The chairman called for reports of standing- committees. 



In the absence of the chairman, Dr. Britton made a brief verbal 

 report for the Audubon Monument Committee, and requested that 

 the committee be continued. Granted. 



The committee on the Joy Memorial reported progress, and re- 

 quested to be continued. Granted. 



Prof. Britton read the following paper by title: — 



A List of Species of the Genera Scirpus and Rynchospora 

 occurring in North America. 



BY N. L. britton. 

 Read Feb. 22, 1892. 



SCIRPUS, L. Gen. PI., 12 (1737). 



The genus Scirpus was described b}" Linn;>3us in his " Genera 

 Plantarum," p. 12 (1737), and he there attributes the name to 

 Micheli Linnseus described the species as known to him in 1753 

 in his "Species Plantarum," jip. 47-52, naming S. articulatus, of 

 Java, first. This is therefore the type of the genus. 



The North American species were monographed by Torrey, in his 

 "Monograph of North American Cyperaceffi" (Ann. Lvc. Nat. Hist. 

 N. Y., iii, 31G-334 (1836)). He recognized fifteen, one of which 

 has since been found to be an Eleocharis. The number now known 

 to me is thirty-six, two of which occur only in Mexico. 



Scirpus is closely related to Eleocharis on the one hand and 

 Rynchospora on the other. I have given a list of the North American 

 species of Eleocharis in the Journal of the New York Microscopical 

 Society, v, pp. 95-111. Scirpus is principally distinguished from 

 Eleocharis by the absence of the persistent enlarged l)ase of the 

 style which is so good a mark of the latter genus. In Scirpus the 

 style is slender and falls away leaving the apex of the achenium 

 merely pointed. 



In this pa})er, as in my preceding one on Eleocharis, I have been 

 greatly assisted by Mr. C. B. Clarke, of Kew, who has determined 



