CYPERACEvE. 155 



liiijT or exceeding the stem, firm, narrowly linear, more or less clian- 

 iielled, ultimately often convolute, slightly rough on the margins 

 towards the apex, pale green, more or less glaucous. Male spike J, 

 sessile or subscssile, cylindrical, blunt, sometimes androgynous, Avith 

 ovate-oval obtuse or abruptly mucronate orange-brown glumes with 

 green midribs and concolorous or very narrowly pale scarious margins. 

 Female spikes 2 to 4, contiguous, or the lowest one sometimes a little 

 remote or even distant from the others, but always far above the 

 middle of the stem, on a short included or very slightly exserted 

 stalk, the upper ones sessile or subsessile, ascending-erect, oblong or 

 ovoid-oblong, very dense, many-flowered. Lowest bract shortly sheath- 

 ing, with a very long foliaceous lamina far exceeding the apex of the 

 male spike; upper bracts not sheathing, but with their lamina usually 

 exceeding the male spike. Glumes of the female flowers roundish- 

 ovate, mucronate or cuspidate, pale reddish-brown, with a green midrib 

 and concolorous margins, shorter than but as broad as the fruit. Fruit 

 ascending or spreading-ascending, not stipitate, oval-obovate, narrowed 

 towards the base, ovoid-trigonous, greatly inflated, with several rather 

 strong ribs and 2 stronger marginal ones, greenish-olive, more or less 

 tinged with brown, pellucidly-punctate or with minute brown dots, 

 I'ather gradually narrowed into a short straight plano-convex smooth 

 shortly 2-toothed beak about one-fourth as long as the rest of the 

 fruit; teeth of the beak erect, smooth. Nut bi'ownish-olive, ovate, 

 triangular-triquetrous, obtuse and attenuated at each end, but most 

 towards the base, scarcely apiculate, very loosely covered by the 

 perigynium. 



Var. a, genuina. 

 Plate MDCLXXV. 

 Stems tall, equalling or a little longer than the leaves. 



Var. 3, minor. 



Stems short, often curved, shorter than the leaves. Spikes and 

 fruit smaller than in var. a, the latter more insensibly attenuated into 

 the beak, which is shorter in proportion to the rest of the fruit. 



In salt marshes and pastures by the sea. Rather rare, but widely 

 distributed, extending along the coast from Cornwall and Kent to 

 Orkney. All the Scotch specimens I have gathered belong to var. y8. 



England, Scotland, Ireland. Perennial. Sununcr. 



Plant growing in dense round tufts. Stems in var. a IH inclios to 



X 2 



