Monograph of North American Carices. o45 



Culm about 6 inches high, triquetrous, with the angles very prominent, 

 striate, smooth, filiform, leafy, at length subdecumbent. Leaves a little 

 glaucous, rather thin and delicate ; the inferior ones abbreviate. Sterile 

 spike on a curved peduncle, about three fourths of an inch long; glumes 

 lanceolate, acuminate, carinate, pale yellowish-brown. Fertile spkes 

 2—3, oblong, 5— 8-flowered, the upper one often subsessile, the others on 

 filiform peduncles, which are frequently two inches or more in length ; 

 glumes ovate, broad at the base, acute, two thirds the length of the fruit, 

 pale brown, with the carina green. Fruit remarkably triquetrous, 

 short-ovate, striate, very loosely arranged on the rachis, with a short ob- 

 tuse and oblique, or slightly curved rostrum ; orifice entire, submem- 

 branaceous. 



Hab. In dry rocky woods, and on hill sides ; Hudson Bay 

 to Pennsylvania ; not uncommon in mountainous districts. 

 Flowers in May. It grows in tufts. 



Obs. This plant, especially when young, has the appear- 

 ance of C. anceps in a depauperate state, but when mature 

 it is easily distinguished by its narrower and delicate leaves, 

 few-flowered spikes, small and remarkably triquetrous fruit. 



79. Carex scabrata.* 



C. spicis fertilibus subquinis, subremotis, cylindraceis, ple- 

 rumque erectis, inferioribus longe-pedunculatis ; fructibus 

 ovatis, acuminato-rostratis, subventricosis, scabris, ore ob- 

 liquo subbifido, gluma ovato-lanceolata ciliatalongioribus. 



C. scabrata, Schw. an. tab. car. 1. c. JJeivey car. 1. c. ix. 

 p. 66. 



Culm about a foot and a half high, remarkably triquetrous above, some- 

 what ancipitous below, leafy. Leaves long, very scabrous, 2—3 inches 

 long, very scabrous, 3 lines broad, the lowest one considerably broader, of 

 a coarse and rank appearance. Sterile spike on a moderately long 

 rigid peduncle ; glumes lanceolate, brown with a green keel. Fertile 

 spikes 3—5, subcylindrical, densely fruited ; the upper ones rather ap- 

 proximate and subsessile, the others distant from one to three inches, 

 pedunculate ; the lowest sometimes a little nodding ; bractece resembling 

 the leaves, overtopping the culm ; glumes ovate-lanceolate, subciliate on 

 the margin, scabrous at the apex, about two thirds as long as the fruit, 

 brownish. Fruit ovate, triquetrous, sides subcarinate, very scabrous, 



