418 | Transactions.— Botany. 
The male flowers are of very simple structure, consisting of three sta- 
mens, without any signs of hypogynous bristles, scales, or other rudiments 
of a perianth, They are very uniform in all the species, and call for few 
remarks here. 
The female flowers are composed of a single-celled, one-ovuled ovary, 
crowned by a short style terminated by two or three long and slender stig- 
matic branches. The ovary and lower portion of the style are enclosed in a 
peculiar bottle or flask-shaped organ called the perigynium, swollen in its 
lower part, but gradually contracted towards the top into a narrow oblique 
or bidentate mouth, closely surrounding the style. It varies exceedingly in 
shape and other characteristics, but is tolerably constant in each species, 
and has thus been largely used for specific circumscription. Inside the 
perigynium, and between it and the ovary, there often exists a minute 
bristle-like body called the seta, or rachilla, and usually considered to be a 
barren pedicel. In the allied genus Uncinia this bristle is invariably pre- 
sent, is much longer, hooked at the tip, and produced beyond the mouth of 
the perigynium. 
The perigynium is a structure unknown except in Carex and its imme- 
diate allies, and much discussion has arisen as to its nature and probable 
origin. Three principal views have been advocated. First, that it repre- 
sents a perianth. Second, that it is to be regarded as of staminal origin. 
Third, that it is composed of one or perhaps two modified bracts. The 
first hypothesis was for long widely accepted, but recent researches have 
brought to light an almost overwhelming amount of evidence in favour of 
the last—or that the perigynium is morphologically to be regarded as an 
altered bract, and the rachilla a rudimentary axis. For a full exposition of 
the evidence in favour of this, reference should be made to two papers by 
Dr. McNab and Professor Thistleton Dyer, printed in the Journal of the 
Linnean Society (Botany, vol. 14, pp. 152-154). 
It follows from the above view of the structure of the female flowers that 
each perigynium must be looked upon as constituting a one-flowered 
spikelet. In the inflorescence of C. lucida, for instance, the terminal spike 
of male flowers would be regarded as a single many-flowered spikelet; the 
lower spikes of female flowers as each consisting of numerous one-flowered 
spikelets. Similarly, an androgynous spikelet, like that of C. pyrenaica, 
must be regarded as being composed of a single several-flowered male 
spikelet, and numerous one-flowered female spikelets. : 
Fruit.—This is a minute trigonous or lenticular achenium or nut, 
enclosed in the persistent and hardened perigynium. Its characters are 
very uniform throughout the species, and are seldom of value for systematic 
purposes, 
