280 Caricograpliy. 
This is the plant considered in Vol. VII. p. 268, to be the 
C. alpesiris, Allion. Although it had been compared with 
this species and pronounced the same, the examination of per- 
ct specimens of C. alpestris lately received from Germany 
shows that the botanist was mistaken, much as our plant re- 
sembles that. C. alpestris is a larger plant ; has larger spikes 
and fruit ; its staminate scale is oblong, obtuse ; its fruit obovate 
or pyriform, distinctly triquetrous, with a shorter beak in pro- 
portion to its magnitude ; its pistillate scale is oblong and long- 
er. These characters clearly distinguish it from our plant. 
Note. C. alba, Henke, which was announced in Vol. VII. 
. 266, and which I have since found in abundance upon 
tsIsland near the Falls, differs from the specimens received 
from Germany in the setaceous form of the leaves. The fruit 
and its scale is rather smaller than those of the European 
a but exactly like them, the fruit on both being 
in maturity. Some ofthe leaves on those from Europe 
are nartow and resemble those upon our plant. 
80. C. oligocarpa. Sehk. 
Muh., Pursh, Eaton, Pers. no. 148, Schw. 
: Schk. tab. Vvv fig. 170. 
Spicis distinctis; spica staminifera solitaria ebracteata ; 
icis fructiferis tristigmaticis ternis subquinquifloris oblongis 
etantibus longo exserte gains et laxis; fructibus 
ovatis triquetris alternis g 
brevi-rostratis ore integris, squama ovata paulo longioribus. 
Culm 6—16 inches high, triquetrous, slender, slightly 
winged, striate, scabrous above, decumbent; leaves linear- 
lanceolate, flat, earinate, striate, rather soft, rough on the 
edge, subradical, with white or tawny sheaths at the base ; 
bracts like the leaves, upper ones surpassing the culm, leafy, 
with short sheaths ; staminate spike single, = trique- 
trous, rather short, from the bract of the upper pistillate, and 
eet staminate scale tawny witha green keel, at 
ength nearly white, ovate-lanceolate, lower one large ; pis- 
tillate spikes two to four, generally three, alternate, oblong; 
three to nine flowered, usually about five-flowered, distant, 
the lowest subradical; with long, slender, exsert and lax pe- 
duncles; the highest peduncle often not surpassing the 
sheath ; fruit ovate, sometimes nearly oboyate, tri Ss 
nesved, glabrous, alternate, short-rostrate and a little re- 
abris nervosis apice excurvis et 
