454 PROCEEDINGS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
scales and deltoid-ovate obscurely short-beaked perigynia. These figures 
of Schkuhr’s agree very well with his descriptions. Furthermore, they 
agree equally well with Willdenow’s diagnoses, for these latter were 
essentially the same as Schkuhr’s. Professor Bailey further states that 
©. sterilis and C. scirpoides are identical with the common American 
plant which he had formerly treated as ©. echinata, var. microstachys, 
a plant with lanceolate or narrowly ovate slender-beaked perigynia; 
and for this aggregate he takes up the name C. sterilis. After thus 
bunching three very different species as ©. sterilis, he separates from 
“our so-called Carex echinata” two plants, C. atlantica and C. interior, 
with “ ample specific characters,” 
Through the kindness of Dr. J. M. Greenman the writer has beet 
able to examine camera-drawings of Willdenow’s original material 5 
while from Professor Carl Mez he has received fragments from the 
original material of Schkuhr. The drawings of the Willdenow mate 
rial of both Oarex sterilis and ©. scirpoides, and the Schkuhr specimens 
of C. scirpoides agree with the original diagnoses. Dr. Greenman has, 
further, compared critically specimens sent him of the different Amer 
can forms with Willdenow’s plants and with authentic specimens of 
C. stellulata, Gooden. (C. echinata, Murray). The identification thus 
made of these forms, leads to a conclusion very different from that 
published by Professor Bailey. These results may best be stated by 
discussing separately the three clearly cut species which have been 8? 
unfortunately confused. 
arex echinata, Murray (C. stellulata, Gooden.). This species ¥ 
long considered a boreal plant of broad range, and it was s0 treat 
by Torrey, Tuckerman, Dewey, Carey, and other early students of 
American Carices. Francis Boott distinctly implied that the Europes 
species occurs in British America, saying: “I have not seen —— 
which I can satisfactorily refer to the European C. stellulata, south 0 
the British provinces of North America.”! Yet Professor Bailey has 
interpreted this to mean that “ Francis Boott questioned if the Amerr 
can plant is the same as the European O. stedlulata (or C. echinata) 5 : 
and in “eliminating the European species from our flora,” he say®' 
“ Definite specific characters of separation are obscure, and yet ie 
convinced that they exist. The American plant is habitually are 
than the European, the scales are sharper and usually longer, nes 
perigynia are more strongly nerved and more attenuated or CoM! 
1 Boott, IIL, I. 56. 
