“~ ~~" om 
POA LAXA AND POA STRICTA. 425 
I have little doubt that Hooker’s P. laxa proper is my var. 
acutifolia. 
In the third edition of ‘ English Botany,’ vol. xi. pp. 115-117, 
Syme has given a very precise and accurate description of 
P. alpina var. acutifolia under the name of P. stricta, Lindeberg, 
for the first time renouncing the name of Poa laxa, with which 
it had, since the time of Sir W. Hooker’s ‘ Flora Scotica’ of 1821, 
been erroneously connected; but unfortunately Syme himself 
falls into the error of identifying it with the Scandinavian Poa 
stricta, which belongs to the P. cenisia group. 
The specimens in Syme’s Herbarium bear out his excellent 
description, and are identical with those collected by myself from 
the same locality. Mr. Hanbury’s series are also the same thing, 
and a living plant which he brought home and grew for two 
successive years in a suburban garden shows that the leaves 
retain their flat tapering character, while the panicle-branches 
become even more elongate. They seem to me to be essentially 
distinct from Syme’s P. eu-lawxa. 
In the seventh edition of the ‘Manual’ Prof. Babington uses 
the name P. laxa with the same description as in the third, but 
adds as a synonym “ P. stricta, Syme 763” (i.e. t. 1763], omitting 
the Ben Nevis locality. 
In the third edition of the ‘Student’s Flora’ (1884), p. 493, 
Sir J. Hooker repeats the description given in the first edition, 
but characterizes the two forms as “PP. laza proper; leaves 
chanuelled, tip concave, panicle open in flower, closed in fruit. 
P. flexuosa, Sm. ; P. minor, Gaud.,”’ both synonyms being wrong ; 
and ‘“‘sub-sp. P. stricta, Lindb. ; leaves flat to the tip, panicle 
open in flower, spreading in fruit”; this being the var. acutt- 
Sfolia. 
In Professor Babington’s Herbarium there are several sheets 
of specimens labelled Poa Jawa, most of which are to be referred 
to my acutifolia, as, for instance, those already alluded to as 
collected by J. H. Balfour in 1846, and others gathered by 
the Rev. A. Ley on July 15, 1876, labelled by him P. stricta, 
Lindeb. These are, as the date suggests, immature, and are just 
those small rather narrow-leaved plants with scarcely exserted 
narrow panicle which is the early condition of my acutifolia. 
These differ so widely from the late autumnal state as to make 
it difficult to realize that they are the same. Fortunately, I have 
been able to gather plants in which both the fully-developed 
