ENGELMANN—N. AM. SP. OF GENUS JUNCUS. 425 
will stand in place of eee plates, and will, it is believed, 
be far preferable to the 
Arrangement, whew numerous species of the Genus Juncus* 
have been divided into sections according to characters taken 
from their organs of vegetation, their stems and leaves and 
also their inflorescence, more than from the differences found 
in their flowers or fruits. In these most essential parts all 
the species show a remarkable uniformity, which will only 
permit us to make use of them to characterize minor divisions, 
and for specific diagnosis. Desvaux (Journ. Bot., Vol. 
Paris, 1808) had already separated our Juncus repens, on 
account of a peculiarity in the dehiscence of the capsule, and 
some alpine species, because of their long-tailed seeds, as 
two distinct ganas, Cephaloxys and Marsippospermum. 
But we know now that other species of far different alliance 
form a tran nition ay the ordinary loculicidal to the sep- 
tifragal dehiscence, and that species of all forms and sections, 
ae otherwise very dissimilar among themselves, have tailed 
seeds, and that others exhibit all the transitions from 
the tailed and loosely tunicated to the merely pointed and 
closely coated seed. From the papaya it will appear that 
these genera cannot bik even as sectio 
Vegetative Organs.—The different lini of the rootstalks, 
and of the stems and leaves of these plants, are so well 
eed n l i 
bear knotted leaves. But I must say that we have forms tha 
and so-called lateral nea To thi is section we ar 
bound to refer J. Drummondi a 
mis, which can scarcely be tescethati from them, i is, in “all our 
i rrem 
to class it with this or with the similar looking but fst-lonved 
J, — if J. Greenii did not unite it more directly with 
r one. 
The pai of leaves is not quate constant. While those of - 
ribe 
articulate Junci are usually d as terete or compre 
ed-terete, the observations ne our southern botanists aed 
* Steud 196 i many 
? ‘— 
of them, — peter ners soma ” 
