248 
HVAMORE. 
Helene, 
Ragneidur, 
Martha, 
The customary Icelandic ceremony of saluting 
each individual, not even excluding the servants, 
being at length gone through, we entered the 
house, and, after a few cups of coffee, soon found 
ourselves seated before a dinner of roasted meat, 
sago-jelly, and waffels. The country round Hva- 
more, which is flat and swampy, produces but 
little that is interesting to the botanist. A Ca~ 
rex , however, which grows here in the greatest 
profusion, deserves to be mentioned on account 
of its utility to the Icelandic farmer. During the 
course of our ride in the morning, the Tatsroed 
had pointed out the foliage of the plant in many 
places, and assured me that it was found the 
most useful of all the indigenous gramineous 
tribe; for that the sheep and cows afforded a 
more abundant supply of milk from being fed in 
pastures where it was abundant, and it made 
excellent hay. At Hvamore, acres of ground 
were uninterruptedly covered with it, and I was 
here enabled to collect many specimens in flower, 
and to satisfy myself that it was a species with 
which I was unacquainted, though approaching 
very nearly in habit to C. stricta , from which 
it differs essentially in being much smaller in 
all its parts, and in having the spikes remarkably 
} 
Daughters. 
