RUSHES 



JUNCACEAE 



"Where is this stranger? Rushes, ladies, rushes! 

 Rushes as green as summer for this stranger." 



The dark-green leaves of rushes, common in lanes, by waysides, 

 and in all marshy places, add their verdure to the green carpeting 

 of the grasses, and indeed are often familiarly comprised under 

 the all-embracing name of " grass." Rushes, however, belong to a 

 distinct family, and, being closely related to the lilies, are essen- 

 tially lily-like in the form of the tiny green blossoms. 



In song and story we are familiar with poetical allusions to 

 "the gleaming rushes," yet many of the so-called "rushes" belong 

 to the sedge family, and are far larger than our common Eastern 

 species of the true rushes and seem to a passing glance fully as 

 rush-like in appearance. While it is true that plants of this genus, 

 {J uncus), resemble both grasses and sedges in colour and tex- 

 ture, the student should have no difficulty in distinguishing them, 

 since each flower of the rushes, like a miniature lily, shows a per- 

 fectly six-parted perianth, three to six stamens, and three stigmas. 



The largest of our common species is the Bog Rush (Juncus 

 efjusus) which grows in clumps in moist places and is so often seen 

 by waysides and in low meadows. The round stems, stiffly erect, 

 are from two to four feet in height, and are filled with soft, white 

 pith. The stem is leafless, and several inches below the pointed 

 tip hangs a many-flowered cluster of green blossoms which seems 

 to have burst from the stem, though, in reality, the upright por- 

 tion above the blossoms is a leaf of the inflorescence, and as this 

 leaf appears as a continuation of the stem it causes the flower 

 cluster to seem lateral. The Bog Rush is one of the few meadow 

 plants that remain green until late autumn, and even in winter we 

 may often notice low tufts of the dark-green stems by winding 

 brooks. 



The Jointed Rushes are peculiar in that the interior hollow 

 portion of their leaves is divided by horizontal, membranous par- 



329 



