86 
THE AMERICAN BOTANIST. 
after it has appeared above the ground and is said to be 
much like asparagus in taste. 
So few of the flowerless plants are used for food that 
it is something of a surprise to find, at least, three kinds 
of terns edible. These are collected just as the fronds are 
unrolling and boiled. The species most commonly used is 
the cinnamon fern {Osmunda) though it has rather too 
much mucilage in its make-up to suit the ordinary palate. 
The young fronds of the Ostrich fern (Struthioptens) are 
also used, though it ought to be considered little less than 
sacrilege to destroy such magnificent plants to gratify a 
taste for green things. The bracken (Pteris) crosiers are 
occasionally eaten but they lack the tenderness of the 
others. 
The plants mentioned above are doubtless but a small 
proportion of the v^ild species used for the table. All 
parts of the country have their own peculiar plants. The 
knowledge that they are edible has in many cases been 
derived from the Indians ; in others it has come by way 
of experiment in times of a scarcity of better food. It 
would be interesting to know how many more can be 
added to this list, especially in the South and West. 
Joliet. 111. 
BOTANY FOR BEGINNERS— XX. 
THE SEDGES (CYPERACE^). 
Although the sedges are of small importance to man 
the immense number of species seem to warrant the con- 
clusion that they are of considerable use in Nature's 
economy. There are nearly three thousand species. Like 
their allies, the grasses, these plants are distributed 
throughout the world being most common, doubtless, in 
the swamps and wet meadows of temperate regions. 
Some few species are found on dry land, just as some 
grasses are nearly aquatic, but as a general thing the 
sedges keep to the moist places and the grasses to the 
drier ones. Although the sedges of the tropics are tall and 
T^uxuriant, this branch of the order Graminales seems not 
