306 T. Holm — Studies in the Cyperacece. 



Car ex spectabilis Dew.* 



This species, although well defined by Dewey (1. a), has been 

 overlooked by several authors and has been described as new 

 " G. invisa Bailey," or confounded with various other species, 

 for instance, with G. macrochwta Mey. var. pseudopodoearpa 

 Kiikthl., and G. podocarpa R. Br. We can add nothing to 

 the diagnosis except that the culm is aphyllopodic, and that 

 the scale-like leaves of the densely matted rhizome become 

 fibrillose. It is said to have been originally collected in u the 

 Arctic Region," but since then it has been found in several 

 places in the mountains of British Columbia, Washington and 

 California. In regard to G. podocarpa R. Br. we might state 

 that Mr. C. B. Clarke has informed us that a careful examina- 

 tion of Robert Brown's specimen has convinced him that it is 

 merely a young specimen of G. rariflora Sm. 



Carex vulgaris Fr. 



This plant offers an excellent example of a species dis- 

 tributed over a wide geographical area and possessed of great 

 plasticity in respect to variation throughout the northern hemi- 

 sphere. And so numerous are the varieties that Fries thought 

 it would require a book to enumerate and describe them all ; 

 moreover, the variation is expressed in quite a distinct way 

 w T herever the plant occurs, in northern Europe or in the north- 

 western parts of this continent, where the species appears to 

 be best represented. The species was already known to 

 Tournefort and Ray as " Cyperoides" and u Gramen" while 

 Linnaeus was the first to describe it as a " Carex " : nigra vema 

 vulgaris (Flora Lapponica No. 330). Since then it has been 

 described as G. Goodenoughii by Gay ; a name, however, that 

 only applies to the variety "stolonifera" while the typical form, 

 as it occurs in Lapland, has received the name "vulgaris" by 

 Elias Fries (Mant., Ill, p. 153). The plant is so well known 

 and so well described that it is not necessary to reproduce the 

 diagnosis in toto for the sake of illustrating the species as it 

 occurs on this continent, but we might quote a few words 

 about the structure of the perigynium. This organ is by Fries 

 (1. c.) described as being subsessile, persisting, roundish-ellip- 

 tical, many-nerved and longer than the obtuse scales; that the 

 perigynium, sometimes, is nerveless, is evident from the descrip- 

 tion in Hartmau's Flora of Scandinavia (11th edit.). If we 

 now examine some of the most characteristic European varie- 

 ties, Danish, Norwegian, Swedish and German specimens for 

 instance, the perigynium appears with an outline of from 

 roundish to very narrow elliptical, with a short stipe or strictly 



* This Journal, vol. xxix, p. 248, 1836. 



