Ovrtx.] LXXXVttl. CtPEKACEA 603 



with a long slender beak and 3 styles. C. saxatilis, Linn, (pulla, Good, 

 and Qrahami, Boott); stems 4 to 10 inches, spikelets smaller, fewer, fruits 

 nearly smooth with a short beak and 2 styles. Lofty Scotch mountains. ] 



47. C. paluflosa, Gooden. (fig. 1157). Marsh C. A stout, long- leaved 

 species, with a creeping rootstock and triangular stems, 2 to 3 feet high. 

 Male spikelets 2 or 3, above an inch long, and sessile. Female spikelets 

 2 or 3, rather distant, cylindrical, often 2 inches long, sessile, or the 

 lowest shortly stalked. Bracts leafy, without sheaths. Glumes more 

 or less pointed. Styles 3 -cleft. Fruits ovate, slightly 3-angled, but 

 much flattened, tapering into a very short, spreading point or beak. 



In wet meadows, and marshes, throughout Europe and central and 

 Russian Asia, except the extreme north, and North America. Frequent 

 in England, Ireland, and southern Scotland, less so in the north. PL. 

 spring and early summer. A taller variety with longer female spikelets, 

 on longer stalks, more pointed glumes, and a more distinct beak to the 

 fruit, has been distinguished as a species under the name of C h rivaria. 

 Curtis. It is also said to have the minute point on the anthers more 

 distinct ; but all these characters appear to be too variable to be relied 

 upon as specific. It grows with the^ smaller form, and is rather more 

 frequent in Britain. 



LXXXIX. GEAMINE^E. THE GRASS FAMILY. 



Herbs, with stems usually hollow, except at the nodes, and 

 alternate, narrow, parallel-veined, entire leaves, sheathing the 

 stem at their base, but the sheaths are usually split open on 

 the side opposite to the blade, and terminate, within the base 

 of the blade, in a small scarious appendage called a ligule. 

 Flowers in spikelets, arranged in terminal spikes, racemes or 

 panicles. Each spikelet consists usually of 3 or more chaff-like, 

 concave scales or bracts, called glumes, arranged alternately on 

 opposite sides of the spikelet, their concave faces towards the 

 axis ; the 2 lowest, or first and second glumes, usually empty, 

 nearly opposite to each other, and often differently shaped from 

 the others. The succeeding, or flowering glumes, enclose each a 

 rather smaller scale called a palea, usually thinner, and with 2 

 longitudinal ribs or veins, placed either between the gloom and 

 the axis of the spikelet, with its back to the axis, or apparently 

 opposite the glume at the end of the axis. Where there are 

 more than 3 glumes, the third, or lowest flowering glume is 

 usually close to the second, its flower is sometimes imperfect, or 

 it is even quite empty, and it is often intermediate in shape 

 between the outer empty ones and the succeeding flowering ones, 

 which are inserted on the axis at distinct intervals. Within 

 the palea, or apparently between the flowering glume and the 



