470 TRANS. OF THE ACAD. OF SCIENCE. 



mens I find the inflorescence more spreading, and with some- 

 what larger heads, so that thus the transition to the following 

 varieties seems to be given. 



Var. ,3 is 1-3 feet high, and stouter, and bears its larger 

 heads in an almost umbel-shaped, more compact panicle ; 

 heads 5-6 lines in diameter, consisting of 50-90 flowers, each 

 of which is l§-2 lines long; seeds 0.22-0.25 line long, slender, 

 their lengths being equal to 3 diameters. The inflorescence 

 is sometimes looser and more compound, making a transition 

 to the next. 



Var. 7 is a very different looking plant, with a compressed, 

 tall, often inclined and even decumbent stem, which is said 

 to become 4 feet long; leaves laterally compressed, already 

 described by Elliott as gladiate, 3-6 lines wide ; panicle 

 spreading, 8-12 or 15 inches long and about as wide, with 

 distant, sometimes one-sided (usually called sessile) heads, i. e. 

 heads from the base of which a long axillary peduncle springs, 

 which bears a second head that often behaves in the same 

 manner. So far both forms of this variety agree, but in the 

 flowers and in the seeds they appear very different, and may 

 eventually have to be separated, though our best southern 

 botanists do not distinguish them, and seem to agree in the 

 view that it is the rich marshy soil of their ricefields, and sim- 

 ilar localities, which produces these "overgrown" forms. — The 

 fruit-heads of the smaller form have a diameter of 5-6 lines, 

 and are composed of 30 or 40 to 70 or 80 flowers; flowers, i. e. 

 calyx, 2-2£ lines long, sepals about equal in length, and exte- 

 rior and interior ones not more different in structure than is 

 usually the case ; anthers longer than in any other variety of 

 our species, and equal to the filament; seeds the longest and 

 most slender of all the forms, 0.30-0.33 line long, the length 

 equal to 3 or 3£ diameters. — The subvariety major has fruit- 

 heads of 5-7 lines in diameter, the long pointed capsules radi- 

 ating conspicuously in all directions; 20-50 or 60 flowers, 

 2^-2^ lines long, in each head; sepals very unequal in length, 

 as well as in texture, the exterior ones triangular dagger- 

 shaped, and at maturity indurated ; the interior ones much 

 shorter, and more or less membranaceous; seeds ovate or 

 almost globose-ovate, obtuse, very abruptly or sometimes 

 scarcely apiculate, 0.20-0.23 line long, the length being equal 

 to 1£ or less than 2 diameters. " 



42. J. Bolanderi, n. sp.: caulibus (bipedalibus ultra) gra- 

 cilibus rectis compressis ; foliorum teretiusculorum striato- 

 rum vaginis longe biauriculatis ; capitulis multi-(30-50)- 

 floris singulis sen paucis in glomerulum congestis seu breviter 

 pedunculatis ; florum (fuscorum) sessilium sepalis lineari- 

 lanceolatis subulatis aequilongis stamina 3 quarta parte su- 

 perantibus capsulamclavato-turbinatam obtusam mucronatam 



