CARYOPHTLLACEJ-;. 109 



long; and short flowering brandies very densely clotlied with 

 leaves, of which those of the base of the shoots are withered, and 

 only about i to f inch at the upper part of the stem has the 

 leaves fresh and green. Elowers -^g inch across. Peduncles very 

 short. Sepals with rather thick but not very prominent veins. 

 Ovary conical, very commonly abortive on the plants with perfect 

 stamens. Seeds dark brown, smoother and less reniform than in 

 most of the species of the genus. Whole jilant dull yellowish 

 green, glabrous with the exception of the edges of the leaves, 

 forming very compact flat cushions often a foot in diameter. The 

 habit is very much like that of Silene acaulis, the barren shoots are 

 somewhat similar to those of Sagina procumbens, and but for the 

 ojiposite leaves would be not unlike those of Saxifraga hypnoides. 



Mossy Cypliel. 



French, Cherlerie Gazonnante. 



The specific name of this plant — which is retained as such, and was formerly 

 applied to the genus — is in honour of John Henry Cherler, who was assistant to the 

 celebrated botanist John Bauhin, and who worked with him in his General History of 

 Plants. 



Section II.— TRIPHANE.E. Fenzl. 



Flowers all perfect. Fructiferous calyx not indurated at the 

 base. Petals oval or ovate, abruptly narrowed into a short claw. 

 Seeds tuberculated. Leaves short, linear or subulate, 3-nerved ; 

 those of the barren shoots and base of the stem crowded. 



SPECIES II.— AL SINE VERNA. BartUng. 



Plate CCXLI. 



Sabulina verna, crespitosa, et Gerardi, Reich, Ic. Fl. Germ, et Helv. Vol. V. Caryoph. 



Tab. GCVII. Figs. 4927, 4929 ; and Tab. CCVIII. Fig. 4928. 

 Arenaria verna, Hook. &, Am. Brit. Fl. ed. viii. p. C6. Sm. Eng. Bot. No. 512. 



Bootstock short, slender, almost woody, dividing into numer- 

 ous branches, each of which produces several erect stems and short 

 ascending barren shoots. Leaves crowded on the barren shoots and 

 at the base of the stem ; those towards the middle and upper part 

 of the flowering stem remote ; all short, linear-subulate, rather 

 acute, strongly 3-nerved. Bracts ovate-lanceolate, acute, with mem- 

 branous margins. Flowers in a terminal cyme, few, sometimes 

 reduced to one. Pedicels two to four times the length of the calyx 

 when mature. Sepals elliptical-lanceolate, acute, strongly 3-nerved, 

 with broad membranous margins. Petals about as long as the 

 sepals, or a little longer, oval, suddenly contracted into a very 



