SEDGE FAMILY. 81 



clustered on the unequal rays of an umbel with the central spikelet or cluster 

 always sessile, or the whole contracted into a dense head. Bractlets coneave 

 and more or less carinate. arranged in 2 ranks in a flattened spikelet. Bristles 

 in the flower none. (Kuperos. an old Greek uame applied by Herodotus to an 

 aromatic plant used by the Scythians for embalming.) 



Style 2-cleft; achene lenticular; rachilla narrow, not winged 1. C. diandrus. 



Style 3-cleft; achene triangular. 



Rachilla not winged, naked or nearly so. 



Stems y 2 to 6 in. high 2. C. aristatus. 



Stems over 12 in. high 3. C. scrrulatus. 



Rachilla clothed with the persistent, decurrent wings of the bractlets. .4. C. crythrorhizos. 



1. C. diandrus Torr. var. castaneus Torr. Described as an annual with 

 stems ! o to 2 ft. high, slender, triangular; leaves elongate, 1 line or less wide; 

 involucral bracts 2 to 3, foliaceous; spikelets linear-oblong, acute, 3 to 6 

 lines long; rachilla not winged; bractlets brown, 1 to 1J4 lines long; stamens 



2 to 3 ; style 2-cleft to the middle ; achene lenticular. 



Swamps near San Francisco, Bolander, and in the valley of the Sacramento, 

 Pickering. 



2. C. aristatus Eottb. Annual; stems % to 6 in. high, barely exceeding 

 the leaves; leaves % line or less wide; involucral bracts foliaceous, % to 2 

 in. long; rays few, V. 2 to 1 in. long; spikelets sessile, densely clustered, 1% to 



3 lines long, flattened; rachilla not winged; bractlets with strongly recurved 

 setaceous tips, striate, chestnut-brown or greenish, 1 line long; style 3-cleft; 

 achene triangular. 



Chico; Jackson; perhaps not occurring within our limits. June. 



3. C. serrulatus Wats. Perennial (?); stems 1% ft. or more high, stout, 

 triangular; involucral bracts 6 to 8, foliaceous, 3 to 18 in. long, 2 to 3% lines 

 wide, flat (or conduplicate?) ; inflorescence irregularly umbellate, with unequal 

 rays; spikelets numerous, in dense umbels, many-flowered, lanceolate, flattened, 



4 to 8 lines long; rachilla not winged, naked, or nearly so; bractlet 1 line long, 

 amplexicaul, broadly ovate, acute, 3-nerved, keeled, not winged at the base; 

 keel serrulate on the back at the apex; stamen 1; style 3-cleft; achene tri- 

 angular. 



Healdsburg, Miss Alice King. 



4. C. erythrorhizos iMuhl. Annual; stems 1 to l 1 /-; ft. high, stout, tri- 

 angular; leaves flat or conduplicate, 6 to 14 in. long, 2 to 3 lines wide; in- 

 volucral bracts 6 to 8, foliaceous, 4 to 12 in. long; rays 1% in. long or less, 

 bearing umbels of spikes which are % to 1 in. long; bracts of involucels shorter, 

 foliaceous; spikelets usually 2 to 3 lines long, narrowly linear, somewhat 

 crowded, horizontally spreading, nearly flat, bright chestnut-color; rachilla 

 clothed with the persistent wings of the bractlets; bractlets 1% lines long, 

 oblong, obtuse, mucronulate; keel smooth; style 3-cleft; achene triangular. 



Lower Sacramento; Visalia. 



2. ELEOCHARIS K. Br. Spike-rush. 

 Animals or perennials. Stems simple, terminating in ;i solitary spikelet 

 not subtended by an involucre. Leaves reduced to sheaths or the lowest rarely 

 blade-bearing; spikelets several to many-flowered. Bractlets concave, im- 

 bricated all around. Stamens 2 to •'!. Bristles '■'< to 9, commonly retrorsely 

 barbed, style usually 3-cleft and achene 3-angled, or 2-rdefl and achene 

 lenticular; base of the style enlarged and persistent as n tubercle on the 

 summit of the achene. (Greek eleo, marsh, charis, delight.) 



