TRIANDRIA MONOGYNIA.
N A R D U S .
Gene. Char. Calyx, none; corolla with two valves. Gen. Plant.
NARDUS STRICTA.
Heath Mat-grass.
Spec. Char. One British species only.
T his simple and elegant heath-loving plant is very commonly to be found, about the middle o f June,
both in dry and damp situations, upon commons and waste places, but it prefers a boggy soil,* and
wherever Erica tetralix vegetates, its little satellite Nardus is generally in the neighbourhood, and the
bright green colour of the straw, and deep violet hue of the florets, tipped with their, white anthers,
readily point it out; straw arising from pencil-like tufts, which are always wrapped round with a dry
and husky sheathing; root-leaves several, about half the length of the straw, bristle-shaped, and
armed with minute spines.
Nardus stricta exists not useless in the great scale of vegetable economy,, but often lends its aid to
give a solidity to turfy bogs, by the matted base of the numerous leaves and straws which rest upon,
and are not buried in the soil, and thus may have been designed by Nature as one of her agents, in
conjunction with Carex, Scirpus, Juncus, &c. and that aquatic tribe of plants, to render the situations
in which they delight, in process of time, firm and useful land; that purpose effected, they decay from
the soil, or are supplanted by better herbage, suitable to animal food: but other means are appointed
besides natural decay to root out Nardus from the land, when the original design has been completed;,
we are told in the Amaenitates Academical that various Tipulas (gnats)) deposit their eggs at the base
of the straws of this .plant, as a dry hybemaculum, or winter quarter, but rooks, and the crow, seeking
for the caterpillar of the Tipulse, with their strong beaks stock up Nardus to dislodge the grub, and
hence the space it occupied is left free for the increase of more nutritive vegetation.------ Perhaps some
little portion of the vast work of Nature, to a weak and half-sighted mortal, may seem an insignificant
creation; yet by one who is not above the consideration of secondary causes, or humbly attempting
the investigation of latent properties, in a world of harmony like that of the vegetable creation, will be
found sufficient to employ his talents, enlarge his understanding, or make him perhaps a better man.
A, part of the Spike.
B, the Corolla.
C, the Germin, &c.
| Nardus stricta is not found however exclusively in low lands, but abounds in the ascents of Ingleborough, and all
the northern mountains: vegetating originally on the boggy summits of these great hills, the roots, or seeds, have probably
been washed down from thence by the winter floods, or equinoctial torrents, and. lodged, in various places where
the earth might have subsided, or impediments been- met with.