Carex. | LXXXVIII. CYPERACEA. | 499 
37. C. panicea, Linn. (fig. 1144). Carnation Curex, Carnation- 
grass.—Stems tufted, but emitting creeping runners from the base, 1 to 
1% feet high, with rather short, erect, flat leaves, more or less glaucous. 
Spikelets usually 3, the terminal one male, the others female, distant, 
erect, stalked, cylindrical, $ to 1 inch long, often loosely imbricated ; the 
flowers, especially in the lowest one, at some distance from each other. 
Bracts shortly leafy, with rather long sheaths. Glumes brown. Styles 3- 
cleft. Fruits ovoid, without ribs except the 3 angles, obtuse, with a very 
short beak or point, like those of C. glauca, from which plant this species 
differs chiefly in the more erect, loose female spikelets, and in the male 
spikelet always solitary. 
In meadows and moist pastures, one of the commonest species through- 
out Europe and temperate Asia, occurring also in North America, Com- 
mon in Britain. Fl. early summer. An alpine variety, not uncommon in 
high northern latitudes, and at considerable elevations in the mountains of 
central Europe, with the sheaths of the bracts looser, the spikelets darker- 
coloured and few-flowered, and the fruits more decidedly tapering into a 
beak, has been distinguished as a species under the name of C, vaginata, 
Tausch. It occurs in some of the Highlands of Scotland. An alpine 
Aberdeenshire plant, which has been referred to the Alpine and Pyrenean 
C. frigida, All., appears to me, from the specimen I have seen, and from 
the figure in Trimen’s ‘ Journal,’ to be rather a foe of this C. vaginata, 
with the beak of the fruit still longer. 
38. ©. capillaris, Linn. (fig. 1145). Capillary Carex.—Stems 
slender, densely tufted, without creeping runners, 3 or 4 to 8 or 9 
inches high, longer than the leaves. Terminal spikelets male, and 
small. Female spikelets 2 or 3, much lower down, but on long, thread- 
like peduncles, so as sometimes to exceed the male, of a rather pale 
colour, loose-flowered, but seldom 6 lines long. Bracts shortly leafy, the 
lower one with a rather large sheath. Glumes very scarious on the edge. 
Styles 3-cleft. Fruits 10 to 12 in each spikelet, tapering into a pointed 
beak. 
In alpine meadows, and on moist rocks, in northern and Arctic: Europe 
and Asia, in the high ranges of central and southern Europe, North 
Asia, and North America. On the mountains of the north of England 
and Scotland, but rare and local; not in Ireland. 7. summer. 
39, C.limosa, Linn. (fig. 1146). Mud Carex.—Rootstock creeping. 
Stem slender, from 3 inches to a foot high, with narrow leaves, sometimes 
as long as the stem, sometimes much shorter. Terminal male spikelet 
4 to near 1 inch long. Females 1 or 2, on slender stalks, drooping, 
| rather loose, 6 to 8 lines long. Bracts leafy, without sheaths, or with a 
short, scarious one. Glumes rather dark-brown, ovate, the upper ones 
pointed. Styles 3-cleft. Fruits rather large, roundish, compressed, 
scarcely pointed, and not distinctly beaked. C. errigua, Hoppe. 
In bogs and mountain marshes, in northern and Arctic Europe, North 
Asia, and North America, and in the higher ranges of Central Europe. 
Local in Britain, chiefly in the north, but extending to Dorset and 
Hants. Fl. summer. The C. rariflora, Sm., is a high northern or Arctic 
variety, with the glumes almost black, and more obtuse, and only 5 or 6 
fruits in each spikelet. It occurs, but rarely, in the highest Scotch 
mountains. [It is generally admitted to be a very distinct species. | 
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