TRTANDRIA. MONOGYNIA. Carex. 101 



I 



Leaves roughish at the edge and on the keel. F. spikes 3, 

 distant from each other, florets thinly set. Sheaths ending in 

 leaves shorter than the straw. Capsules compressed at the base, 

 swelling out upwards, bluntish, mouth entire, closed. When 

 young it much resembles the C. recurva, but may be readily 

 distinguished by the sheaths, the lower one in the C. fanlcea 



[ being half as long as the fruit-stalk, but in C. recurva only 1 



quarter the length. Goodenough. Root creeping, throwing out 



i bundles of leaves and stems from the joints. Stems bluntly tri- 



angular, smooth, 12 to 18 inches high. Leaves smooth, sea- 



■ green, shorter than the stem. Barren spike terminating, more 

 [ . than an inch long, closely tiled. Scales oval. Fertile spikes 

 ) mostly 2, upright, loosely tiled. Fruit- stalks long, slender, each 

 | from a joint. Floral-leaves sheathing, 1 at the base of each 

 j fruit-stalk, as long as the spike which belongs to it. Flowers 

 \ alternate, many abortive. Scales egg-shaped, or egg-spear- 

 shaped, not above half as long as the capsule. Summits 3. 

 Capsules oval, bluntly pointed. Woodw. 



Pinky Seg. Moist meadows and pastures, [frequent in Suff. 



■ Mr. Woodw. — On Dartmoor, common.] P. May, June.* 



28. C. Sheaths inclosing half the fruit-stalk. Fern, spikes capilia'ris, 



oblong, limber, pendant when ripe : fruit-stalk hair- 

 like: capsules tapering to a point. 



Dicks, h. s.-FL dan. l6S-Scop. 59. 



j Root fibrous. Straw 8 to 5 inches, upright, 3-cornered, an- 



gles smooth. Leaves very slender. M. spike single, termi- 

 nating, slender, of very few flowers. F. spikes 2 (or 3) few. 

 flowered. Capsules egg-shaped, beak-pointed, entire at the end, 

 longer than the scales, which are deciduous. Summits 3. The 

 small size of this plant, its fine slender fruit-stalks, its pendul 

 fem. spikes with 4 to 8 florets, and its deciduous scales, are cha- 

 racters amply sufficient to distinguish it. Goodenough. — Smaller, 

 narrower and more delicate than C. pallescens. Straw when in 

 flower shorter than the leaf, scarcely a finger's breadth high, with 

 a single leaf, with 4 upright spikes at the end, 1 barren and 3 

 fertile ; but some time after it becomes a span high, thread-like, 

 upright, with a single sheathing leaf shorter than the stem ; and 

 when the fruit is ripe a foot in height. Spikes on fruit-stalks ; 

 the fertile ones mostly 3. Floral-leaves gradually smaller up- 

 wards, the uppermost hardly leafy. The barren and the upper- 

 most fertile spike from the same point. Capsules brown, alter- 

 nate, remote, distant, fixed to hair-like pedicles. Scales falling 

 off when the capsules ripen. Linn. 



* Captults often affected with the smut % in which case they are globu- 

 lar, larger, black, full of a mealy powder. Almost all the other species 



are liable to the same disease, but in thi* it is as common as it is mc in 

 the rest. Lin*. 



