576 CYPEEACE^. [Carex. 



37. C palitdosa, Gooden. Lesser Common Sedge. "Barren 

 spikelets about 3, with obtuse glumes, anthers with a very minute 

 point or pointless, fertile spikelets about 3 cylindrical obtuse 

 erect, sheaths none, bracteas very long foliaceous, glumes narrow 

 acuminated, fruit subcoriaceous oblong-ovate striated with a short 

 usually bifid beak."— 5r. Fl. p. 507. E. B. t. 807. Host. Gram. 

 Aust. i. 68, t. 93. C. acuta, Curt. Fl. Land. fasc. 4, t. 61. Gooden. 

 Trans. Linn. Soc. ii. p. 202. 



In wet meadows and ditches ; not common with us. Fl. April, May. Fr. 

 July, n- 



E. Med. — Plentifully intermixed with C. riparia by the stream-side above Al- 

 verston mill, 1848 ; also in a wet meadow a little above the mill. In a moist 

 meadow nearly opposite the stables and laundry at Sleephill, in plenty, 1842. In 

 a bogjgy spot on the skirts of Lake common, also along marsh-ditches by the 

 roadside just before coming to Sandown village, plentifully, 1840. 



W. Med. — Boggy meadows near the hoiel at Freshwater gate, common. Abun- 

 dantly by the water-courses just above Yafford mill, 1846. Frequent in wet mea- 

 dows about Brixton ; abundant in boggy meadows at Moor Town and all the way 

 to Bottle Hole, in the wet willow-thickets. 



Root creeping and stoloniferous. Culm erect, 1, 2, 3, or even 4 feet high, very 

 sharply triangular and rough in the upper part, glaucous-green, the faces of the 

 sides depressed and striated. Leaves erect, shorter than the culm, often as broad 

 or nearly so as in C. riparia, at least in the more luxuriant specimens; bright 

 green above, very glaucous beneath, and in every respect similar to the foregoing. 

 Bracts leaf-like, the lowermost by far the largest and longest, a little overtopping 

 the staminate spikes, the next one above usually about equal to or rather shorter 

 than the spikes, the rest greatly smaller and shorter than the two lowermost, that 

 of the terminal spike even obsolete. Sheaths none. Staminate spikes usually 3, 

 with mostly the same number of pistillate ones, the former lanceolate and some- 

 what acute, but less tapered or elongated than in C. riparia, and hence by com- 

 parison blunter,* obtusely trigonous, the two superior approximate, the lowermost 

 a little remote, all sessile, sometimes a little compound at bottom, the inferior and 

 even the next above it with usually a few pistillate flowers at their base, erect or 

 at most but slightly inclining when in flower, not nodding or almost drooping as 

 in C. riparia. Glumes oblongo-elliptical, more or less obtuse or even rounded at 

 summit, a few occasionally, and especially of the lowermost, somewhat acute, 

 brownish purple, darkest towards their tips, with a green line or keel ; viewed in 

 the aggregate of the unopened spike they appear deep purple or blackish and 

 shining, with a copper reflexion. Stamens similar to those of C. riparia, but the 

 anthers are quite destitute of the subulate point or awn so conspicuous in that,f 

 and which, though not noticed as a character in the description, has not been 

 overlooked by Curtis in his admirable plates of these two species in Fl. Londinen- 

 sis. Pistillate spikes about 2 — 2^ inches long, remote, subcylindrical, very slen- 

 der and erect when in flower, mostly tipped with a few staminate flowers, and 

 often compound or branched at base, the upper on veiy short stalks or nearly ses- 

 sile, the lowermost on somewhat longer peduncles; their glumes vevj similar to 

 those of C. riparia, ovato-oblong, dark purple brown, with a green keel or rib, 

 those at or towards the base ending abruptly in long, sharp, serrate, scabrous 

 points, of which those nearer the summit of the spike are gradually deprived, the 

 highest being simply acuminate. Styles 3. Perigynes closely imbricated in 

 about 6 or 8 rows, widely spreading, whitish brown, many-ribbed, smooth and 



* This bluntness is most evident when the anthers are protruded; the spike has 

 then a clavate outline. 



f The connectivum merely terminates in an fextremely short, minute and broad 

 point, which is often obsolete or nearly so. 



