8o 
[41] Fifthly, Of Plants. 
AND 
i. Of fuck Plants as are common with us in ENGLAND. 
HEdghog-grafs} 
Mattweed? 
Cats- tail? 
1 Gerard by Johnson, p. 17, — Carcx Jlava, L. ; the first species of this genus 
indicated in North America, and common also to Europe. There is no doubt of 
the reference, taking Josselyn's name to be meant for specific, and to refer to 
Gerard's first figure with the same name. But it is certainly possible that our 
author had in view only a general reference to Gerard's fourteenth chapter, " Of 
Hedgehog Grasse," which brings together plants of very different genera; and, 
in this case, his name is of little account. Cutler (Account of Indig. Veg., /. c, 
1785) mentions three genera of Cyfteracece, but not Carcx ; nor did he ever pub- 
lish that description of our true Graminece " and other native grasses," which, he 
says (/. c, p. 407), "maybe the subject of another paper." The first edition of 
Bigelow's Florula Bostoniensis (1814) has seven species of Carex, which are in- 
creased to seventeen in the second edition (1S24) ; the list embracing the most 
common and conspicuous forms. The genus has since been made an object of 
special study, and the number of our species, in consequence, greatly increased. 
A list of Carices of the neighborhood of Boston, published by the present writer 
in 1841 (Hovey's Mag. Hort.), gives forty-seven species; and Professor Dewey's 
Report on the Herbaceous Plants of Massachusetts, in 1840, reckons ninety-one 
species within the limits of his work. 
2 Johnson's Gerard, p. 42, — English matweed, or helme (the other species 
being excluded, as not English, by our author's caption) ; which I take to be 
Calamagrostis arenaria (L.) Roth, of Gray, Man., p. 548; called sea-matweed 
in England, and common to Europe and America. But if the author only in- 
tended to refer to Gerard's "Chapter 34, of Mat-weed," — which is perhaps, on 
the whole, unlikely, — his name is of no value. 
8 Gerard, p. 46, — Typha latifolia, L., — common to America and Europe. 
