502 



Flowers often disposed in an imbricated manner. Seed 

 in a few instances surrounded with bristles. When these 

 are extended into a kind of wool, hanging out beyond the 

 scales, such a character marks the genus Eriophorum." 

 Linnaeus asserts that " Scirpus differs from Carex, in 

 having all the flowers united, whereas in the latter some 

 scales are accompanied with stamens only, others with 

 pistils ;" but he forgot the tunic, or arillus, of the seed, 

 which makes the essential and clear character of Carex. 

 He mistakes also in supposing the stamens are always 

 three in this order; in several instances they are but two, 

 in a few they are solitary. Much has been done respect- 

 ing the genera and species of this order by Rottboll, Vahl, 

 Brown, Schrader, and others. Linnaeus has made a ma- 

 nuscript correction in the Calamarice, excluding from 

 thence Typha and Sparganium, which he would remove 

 to the preceding order, principally, it seems, because he 

 judged the latter to be very closely allied to Zostera ; as 

 well as on account of its anthers, but we can trace no re- 

 semblance in those to the Piperita. On the contrary 

 they and their filaments agree with the Calamaricc. The 

 stamens of Typha indeed are somewhat different, and Mr. 

 Brown, in his Prodromus Flora Nova Hollandia, has an- 

 ticipated this alteration of Linnaeus. 



Order 4. Gramina. "The true Grasses compose as 

 peculiar a family as the Palms. They are the most com- 

 mon plants in the world, making about a sixth part of the 

 vegetable kingdom, especially in open situations. There 

 they multiply, and extend themselves by their creeping 

 roots, prodigiously. In confined and woody places they 

 scarcely creep, but stand erect. They are the most im- 

 portant of all vegetables, for this reason, that they are 

 the chief support of such animals as depend on vegetable 

 food. They make the verdure of our summers, and the 

 riches of rustic life. Their leaves are not easily hurt by 

 being trampled on, and though the severity of winter may 

 wither and fade them, so that in the early spring no ap- 



