355 



stout, rigid, smooth, ten to fourteen-angled, i to 3 feet high. 

 Heads 4 to 8 lines in diameter. Involucral scales ovate, often 

 eroded, dentate at the apex and hairy below. Receptacle hairy, 

 the hairs under the microscope many-celled, appearing acute at 

 the apex or very rarely club-shaped. Flowers about 2 lines 

 high, densely woolly at the base, the bract larger than the 

 flowers acute, white-bearded. Perianth segments spatulate, 

 white-bearded. 



Swamps, New Jersey and Pennsylvania to Florida and Texas. 

 Cuba. June to October. 



4. ERIOCAULON Ravenelii, Chapm. 



E. Ravenelii, Chapm. Fl. 503 (i860). 



Very smooth throughout. Leaves linear, very acute, flat, 

 thick or thin and pellucid, finely five to ten-nerved, somewhat 

 longer than the sheaths. Scapes slender, 4 to 5 inches high, 

 clustered, five to six-sulcate. Sheaths obliquely fissured, acute, 

 nerved like the leaves. Heads i to 2 lines in diameter. 

 Involucral scales scarious, light straw-colored, oblong, very ob- 

 tuse. Bracts a little narrower than the scales, often obtusely 

 pointed and denticulate, fuliginous. Flowers scarcely more 

 than i^ line high, fuscous, smooth. Segments of the outer fer- 

 tile perianth separate, very slender, mucronately pointed ; of 

 the inner somewhat broader, minutely toothed. Ovary sessile ; 

 style parted into two stigmas. Chapman states that the style is 

 occasionally simple and the seeds minutely pubescent. The spec- 

 imens which I have examined failed to show either. 



Wet grounds, S. C. 



5. ERIOCAULON Texense, Korn. . 



E. Texense, Korn. Linnsea, xxvii. 595 (1854). 



Scapes smooth, 8 to 10 inches high, six to seven-sulcate, slender, 

 in the specimens examined solitary. Leaves acuminate, many- 

 nerved, fenestrate, flat, smooth, i to 2 inches long, a little shorter 

 than the sheaths. Roots fibrous, the larger ones nodose. Heads 

 hemispherical, i to 2 lines in diameter. Livolucral scales 

 obovate or nearly orbicular, smooth, entire, straw-colored. Re- 

 ceptacle pilose with silky hairs. Bracts as long as the flowers, 

 cuneate or obovate, the upper part livid, the lower whitish. 



