90 MONOECIA— TRIANDRIA. Carex. 



grass green ; the spikes paler than the last, and rather white, 

 or greyish, in every stage of their growth. Stems 12 or 18 inches 

 high, weak, and partly reclining, with 3 acute rough angles. 

 Leaves sheathing the bottom of the stem, and usually rising 

 above its summit, rough at the edges and keel. Spike when in 

 flower an inch^ or inch and half, long, of from 6 to 10, or more, 

 sessile, erect, ovate,, acute spikelets, each subtended by an ovate, 

 concave, close, membranous hractea, with a green taper point 

 and keel, 2 or 3 of the lowermost bracteas being often length- 

 ened out into an extremely slender, rough, capillary appendage. 

 The spikelets are rarely in pairs ; the lowermost of all sometimes 

 compound. Each consist^s of several barren^ore^5, with about 

 as many fertile ones below them. As the latter ripen seed, the 

 spikelets become roundish, or hemispherical, 3 or 4 of the lower 

 ones being widely separated from each other. Scales ovate, or 

 lanceolate, membranous, hardly so long as the fruit, which is 

 broadly ovate, externally convex, flat or concave within, mode- 

 rately spreading, not reflexed, pale, with a thick green margin, 

 very smooth in every part, except a slight roughness near the 

 cloven point of the heak, of ten scarcely perceptible. Stam. 3. 

 Stigm, 2. 



/3 is rather an accident than a variety, having a division, or branch, 

 at the bottom of the spike, which perhaps Micheli alone has met 

 with. 



The figure in Engl. Bot. is very incomplete, as wanting ihe fruit, 

 which in its ripening state clearly distinguishes this species from 

 the last. Dr. Wahlenberg unites them, having apparently never 

 seen C. divulsa, which though well known to English botanists, 

 is rare on the continent. Specimens are in the Linnaean her- 

 barium, without any place of growth or name, and I have some 

 from Switzerland. Dr. Hooker follows Wahlenberg. Having 

 carefully examined the question, I am satisfied, even without an 

 appeal to the great names of Ray, Micheli, Hudson, and Good- 

 enough. 



18. C. vulpina. Great Compound Prickly Carex. 



Spike thrice compound, dense, obtuse. Fruit spreading, 

 with a notched rough-edged beak. Scales pointed. An- 

 gles of the stem compressed, very sharp. 



C. vulpina. Linn. Sp. PL \ 382. Willd.v. 4.231. Fl.Br.976. Engl. 



Bot. v.b.t. 307. Hook. Scot. 262. Fl. Dan. t. 308. Leers 1 96. 



t.]4.j.5. Schk. Car. U.t.C.f 10. Ehrh. Calam. 87 . 

 C. n. 1364. Hall. Hist. v. 2. 187 ; excluding Barreliefs syn. 

 C. palustris major, radlce fibrosa, caule exquisite triangulari, 



spica brevi, habitiori, compacta ; also spic^ longa, divulsa, seu 



interrupta. Mich. Gen. 69. t. 33. f. 13. 



