TYPHACE^E. (CAT-TAIL FAMILY.) 359 



16. J. xiphioides, Meyer. Stems from a thick creeping rootstock, 2 to 

 4 feet high, 2-edged : leaves usually broad, the sheaths without ligules : heads 

 numerous, brownish, few to many-flowered, in a compound panicle : capsule 

 oblong, acute. 



Var. montanus, Engelm. Lower and leaves narrower: heads few, 

 usually many-flowered. Trans. St. Louis Acad. ii. 481. From New Mexico 

 to Washington Territory and the Saskatchewan. 



ORDER 83. TYPHACE^. (CAT-TAIL FAMILY.) 



Marsh or aquatic herbs, with nerved and linear sessile leaves, and 

 monoecious flowers on a spadix or in heads, destitute of proper floral 

 envelopes. Ovary tapering into a style. Fruit nut-like, 1 or 2-seeded. 



1. Typha. Flowers in a long very dense cylindrical spike terminating the stem. 



2. Sparganium. Flowers in separate dense spherical leafy-bracted heads, which are 



scattered along the summit of the stem. 



1. TYPHA, Tourn. CAT-TAIL FLAG. 



Upper part of the spike consisting of stamens only, intermixed with long 

 hairs ; the lower or fertile part consisting of ovaries, surrounded by club- 

 shaped bristles. Nutlets minute, very long-stalked. Leaves long, sheathing 

 the base of the simple jointless stems. 



1. T. latifolia, L. Leaves flat: staminate and pistillate parts of the 

 spike approximate. Across the continent. 



2. SPARGANIUM, Tourn. BUR-REED. 



The upper heads consisting of stamens only, with minute scales irregularly 

 interposed ; the lower larger, consisting of numerous sessile pistils, each sur- 

 rounded by 3 to 6 scales. Fruit wedge-shaped or club-shaped. Stems 

 simple or branching, sheathed below by the base of the linear leaves. 



* Erect, with branched inflorescence of numerous heads: pistil as lonq as the 



truncate scales: nuts sessile, wedge-shaped, angular: leaves mostly flat and 

 merely keeled, the base triangular with concave sides. 



1. S. eurycarpum, Engelm. Stems stout, 2 to 4 feet high : fruit many- 

 angled when ripe, with a broad and depressed summit abruptly tipped in the 

 centre. From Nevada northward and eastward across the continent. 



* * Erect or rarely floating, with simple or branched inflorescence of numerous 



heads: pistil with conspicuous style longer than the spatulate denticulate 

 scales : nuts attenuated at both ends, with a stalked base, nearly terete : leaves 

 floating or triangular with flat sides in the lower half. 



2. S. simplex, Hudson. Erect, 9 to 15 inches high, slender: inflores- 

 cence simple, the lower heads supra-axillary, sessile or peduncled : fruit more 

 or less contracted in the middle. Across the continent. Exceedingly vari- 

 able, the following varieties coming within our range : 



