C0MMELYNACEA2. (SPIDERWORT FAMILY.) 513 
3. T. rosea, Vent. Small and slender (6'-10' high') smooth- 
leaves Imeargrass-,ike, cilia.e at the base; umbe. simple’o r 71’. 
rZVuA a ZZL7 smM (4 ' wide)> ^ 
Ohder 126. XYRIDACE^. (Yellow-eyed Grass Fa M .) 
Rush-like herbs, with equitant leaves sheathing the base 
of a naked scape, which is terminated by a head of per¬ 
fect 3-androus flowers, with extrorse anthers, a glumaceous 
calyx, and a regular corolla ; the fruit a 3-valved pod con- 
taming many orlhotropous seeds ; — chiefly represented by 
the genus J 
1. XYRIS, L. Yellow-eyed Grass. 
Flowers single in the axils of coriaceous scale-like bracts, 
densely imbricated in a head. Sepals 3; the 2 lateral glume- 
like, boat-shaped or keeled and persistent; the anterior one larger 
and membranaceous, inwrapping the corolla in the bud and decid¬ 
uous with it. Petals 3, with claws, which cohere more or less. 
Fertile stamens 3, with linear anthers, inserted on the claws of 
the petals, alternating with 3 sterile filaments which are cleft and 
plume-bearing at their apex. Style 3-cleft. Pod oblong, free, 
1-celled with 3 parietal more or less projecting placentae, 3-valved. 
Seeds with a minute embryo at the apex of the albumen_Flow¬ 
ers yellow. (SvpU, an ancient name of some plant with 2-edged 
leaves, from £vpov, a razor.) 
, Kunth. Scape slender, from a more or less 
bulbous base, somewhat 3-angled, flattish at the summit, very smooth, 
much longer than the narrowly linear leaves, both commonly twisted 
with age; head roundish-ovoid (4'/-5/' long) ; lateral sepals oblong- 
lanceolate, finely ciliate-scabrous on the narrow wingless keel , and usu¬ 
ally with a minute bearded tuft at the very apex. (X. Jupacai, Michx. 
m part. X. Indies, Pursh. X. flexuosa, Muhl. Cat. X. brevifolia, 
° ^ ort l ,e rn authors, not of Michx )—Sandy or peaty bogs, New Jersey 
and southward to New Hampshire and Ohio, rare except near the 
coast. July _ Sept. — Leaves 1 -8', the scape 3' -14', high. Petals 
minutely toothed at the summit.—This species should have borne 
, U en er £ 8 name °f X. flexuosa, but Elliott appears to have applied 
that name rather to the following species. 
2. X. Caroliniana, Walt. Scape flattish, 1-angled below, 
