502 PROCEEDINGS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 
bending, and orifice of the beak show likewise considerable variation in 
Old World specimens, all of which can be matched by our plant, while 
the curving of the base of the style is a tendency not infrequent in 
American as well as European specimens. On the other hand, the 
straight style supposed to characterize the American plant is clearly 
represented by Lange in his plate of C. pilulifera, var. longibracteata. 
The deeper purple coloring of the lower sheaths of the American 
plant, a character much emphasized by authors, is uot a satisfactory 
distinction. The color in the American plant is usually conspicuous 
and is pronounced by Mr. F. Schuyler Mathews a dilute maroon with 
no true purple tendency, but rather fading in the older sheaths to 
chestnut. Mr. Mathews, who has likewise examined the sheaths of 
European specimens, finds the same red present in them. This color 
of the sheaths generally fades with age, yet in specimens collected by 
John Ball on Snowdon, by Andersson at Stockholm in 1860, by Laurén 
at Strémbacka in 1855, and by Tuckerman at Upsala in 1841 or 1842, 
show quite as conspicuous a red as the average American plant. 
The bright green color of the leaves of C. pilulifera has likewise been 
maintained as a character separating that plant from the American C. 
communis. From dried specimens alone it is impossible to make this dis- 
tinction apparent, although the fresh plant may sometimes show a brighter 
color than is often seen in C. communis. Yet in the American plant the 
leaves vary from a weak to a deep green, and in Bailey’s var. Wheeleri, 
which is certainly inseparable from European specimens of C. pilulifera, 
the leaves were originally described as “ bright green.” 
The length of the staminate spikelet and the breadth of the leaves, 
two characters upon which stress is sometimes laid, were not emphasized 
by Dr. Boott. An examination of the accompanying table of measure 
ments of the inflorescence will show that the length of the staminate 
spikelets is thoroughly inconstant and not concomitant with other char- 
acters. In fact, both short and long staminate spikelets are often found 
on the same individual, as shown by Haldcsy’s no. 1064 of the Austro- 
Hungarian Exsiccatae (staminate spikelets from 7 to 18 mm. long); by 
Fernald’s no. 151 from Maine (spikelets 6 to 13 mm. long), and @ 
Faxon plant from Franconia, New Hampshire (spikelets from 8 to 
mm. long). The variations in the breadth of the leaf, likewise, are 
very great on both continents. The young leaves at the fruiting season 
are naturally much narrower than the old and weather-beaten ves, 
which, unfortunately, are too often torn away in the preparation of 
attractive specimens. Measurement of the breadth of these older leaves 
