PARONYCHIACE.E. 109 



' Stems numerous, prostrate, filiform, reddish, leafy. Leaves 

 roundish, tapering at the base and with a minute apex, quite 

 smooth and slightly fleshy. Flowers in axillary clusters (appa- 

 rently whorled) . Calyx white, glabrous, often beautifully marked 

 with crimson spots. 



Boggy places in the south-west of England. Annual or peren- 

 nial ? July-September. 



Sub-Order Sgleranthe.e. — Leaves linear-subulate or subulate. 



ScLERANTHUS, Lifi. — Auuual or perennial? plants, with spread- 

 ing or ascending stems, and linear-subulate, opposite, often in- 

 curved leaves. Calyx campanulate or urceolate, contracted at the 

 orifice by a prominent disc (ring), with a five-cleft limb and 

 lanceolate segments. Petals 5, or fewer by abortion, filiform or 

 absent. Stamens 5. Styles 2, filiform, free (not united at the 

 base). Capsule membranous, oblong, one-seeded, indehiscent, 

 enveloped in the indurated calyx. 



S. annuus, Lin. Annual Knaivel. — e.b. 351. l.b.s. 399. 

 A. 17. C. 80. Lat. 50-58°. Alt. 0-350 yds. Tern. 52-4J.°. 



Stems slender, round, usually in rather dense tufts, forked, 

 leafy, with short, dense pubescence. Leaves subulate, connate at 

 the base and ciliated for a part of their extent. Divisions of the 

 calyx lanceolate, vn\h very narrow, scarious, whitish margins, 

 spreading, erect or slightly divergent. 



In fields by roadsides, etc. Annual ; June-September. 



S. perennis, Lin. Perennial Knawel. — e.b. 352. l.b.s. 400. 

 A. 2. C. 4. Lat. 51-53°. Alt. 0-? yds. Tem. 51-48°. 



Stems as in S. annuus, but more glabrous. Leaves linear-subu- 

 late, subulate, but of a deeper green than the former. Divisions 

 of the calyx blunter, and with a scarious margin, which is broader 

 than in the calyx of S. annuus. When in fruit the divisions are 

 erect or conniveut. 



Sandy fields in Sufiblk and Norfolk. Annual or perennial? 

 August-October. 



This has' a different aspect : it is a more leafy, darker- coloured 

 plant than S. annuus, and grows in closer tufts.^ 



* Near the Steam-boat Pier at Wandswortli a plant of this famUy was picked 

 up about three years ago ; we have never observed it there since, nor has any other 

 species of the Order been observed m that locahty, rich though it be in exotic spe- 

 cies. The specimen and the memorandum ai'e both either lost or mislaid. 



