CVPEKACEyE. 123 



without a very short herbaceous subulate lamina, the others without 

 any. Glumes of the female flowers obovate-oblong, obtuse or trun- 

 cate, subapiculate, wrapped round the fruit, chestnut, with a green or 

 pale keel and very broad white scarious margins, about as long as 

 and broader than the fruit. Fruit erect, indistinctly stipitate, obovate, 

 triquetro-trigonous, not inflated, longly and gradually narrowed at the 

 base, with 1 rib on two of the taccs, finely pubescent, green, ultimately 

 olive brown, abruptly acuminated into an extremely short entii'e 

 straight point or beak. Stigmas 3. Nut brown, stipitate, obovate, 

 triquetrous, apiculate, closely covered by the perigynium. 



In woods and bushy places on limestone hills. Local. It occurs 

 on St. Vincent's Rocks, Somerset, and several places in Wilts; in i\Ion- 

 mouth ; Gloucester ; Hereford ; Nottingham ; and Yorkshire ; perhaps 

 also in Devon and Derby. 



England. Perennial. Spring. 



Rootstock growing in dense tufts, with the sheaths reddish at the 

 base. Stems numerous, produced from the axils of the lower leaves 

 of leafy shoots, 6 to 12 inches high, with 2 or 3 leafless sheaths at 

 the base. Male spike | to f inch long. Female spikes ^ to 1 inch 

 long, their stalks nearly Avholly included in the sheathing bracts which 

 are split at the apex; the lowermost sheath has its broad white scari- 

 ous margins extended into a short lobe on each side of the subherba- 

 ceous central portion, which is produced into a short subulate foliaceous 

 point, but occasionally in the lower and always in the upper sheaths 

 the herbaceous portion is barely excurrent and the scarious margins 

 are not produced into lobes. The male spike and the iippermost 

 female spike have their stalks both inclosed m the bract of the female 

 spike, and the stalk of the male spike being no longer, indeed gene- 

 rally a little shorter, than that of the female spike, while the female 

 spike itself is longer than the male one, the apex of the uppermost 

 female spike extends beyond that of the male : usually all the female 

 spikes are approximate, but occasionally, in luxuriant specimens, the 

 lowest spike is nearly 1 inch distant from the others. The nut is 

 conspicuously stalked, and this stalk is included in the narrowed base of 

 the fruit, the upper part of the nut fitting tightly to the perigynium. 

 The habit of the plant is not unlike that of Luzula Forsteri (/). C). 



Fingered Sedge. 

 French, Carex digiie. German, Gcfiii'jcde Segge, 



» a-. 



