THE FLOKAL envelopes in (iKAMlNEA<; AND CYPERACEjE. 



73 



The second bract beneath the uppermost flowers of lAizula cam- 

 pestris is usually divided almost to the base. 



In all cases where I have looked into the matter, it seems to me 

 evident that the lower and inner barren glumes of the spikelets of 

 grasses is next the rachis, i.e., on the inner side of the branch 

 (spikelet), and therefore the position of the absent bract is (as has 

 been already proved by its actual presence in instances just given) 

 alternate with and anterior to the lower and inner barren glume. 



Now the utriculus of Carex is also always next the rachis, and 

 its subtended bract is alternate and anterior ; the position of the 

 utriculus is therefore exactly that of the inner and lower barren 

 glume of grasses, and the position of the subtending bract of the 

 female spike of Canw is exactly that of the usually suppressed 

 bract at the base of the spikelets of grasses. 



I contend, therefore, that the homologue of the inner and lower 

 barren glume of grasses is the ochrea or utriculus of Carex, while 

 the homologue of the suppressed bract at the base of the spikelet 

 in grasses is the subtending bract of the utriculus of Carex. 



I have said that the tendency of the utriculus or ochrea (the 

 ochrea being undoubtedly the homologue of the utriculus) is to 

 become divided, and this division has been shewn to occur in the 

 lower barren glume of Festuca ; the tendency also occurs in the 

 pale of grasses generally, which is the homologue (in the upper and 

 fertile florets) of the utriculus of Carex, as the fertile glume of the 

 spikelet in grasses is the homologue of the subtending bract of the 

 utriculus in Carex. 



Pig. 19.— These drawings represent a branch from a panicle of Crypsis 

 aadeata. The second drawing shows the first one magnified. The bract c, is 

 alternate with the bract (not shown in the drawing) from which the branch a 

 springs. The secondary, clasping, two-nerved bract c, having been removed in 

 the second drawing, exposes to view the rudiment c1, which occupies tlie same 

 place within the axil of c as the rudiment within the utriculus of Carex. This 

 rudiment is usually present within the axils of all the secondary bracts of the 

 panicle. It is present within the nxil of the bract e. 



I^-B. — The small letters, a and b, refer to the same parts in both figures. 



