96 CONTRIBUTIONS FROM THE NATIONAL HERBARIUM. 
47. Panicum amarulum sp. nov. 
DESCRIPTION. 
Plants glaucous but less so than in P. amarum, glabrous throughout, cespitose 
in large bunches sometimes as much as a meter across, 1 to 2 meters high; culms 
simple above the base, stout, some- 
times 1 cm. thick; sheaths mostly 
overlapping; ligules dense, about 3 
mm, long; blades erect or ascending, 
20 to 50 cm. long, 5 to 12 mm. wide, 
broadest at the base, more or less 
involute, pilose at the base on the 
upper surface; panicles finally ex- 
serted, one-third the height of the 
plant or more, 5 to 10 cm. wide, 
slightly nodding, compact, densely 
flowered, the long, fascicled branches 
erect but more or less spreading at 
their tips, spikelet-bearing from the 
base; spikelets short-pediceled, 4.3 to 
5.9 mm. long, 1.7 to 2 mm. wide, 
narrowly ovate, acuminate, strongly 
nerved; first glume half to two-thirds as long as the spikelet, acuminate, 5 to 
7-nerved; second glume slightly longer than the sterile lemma, both 7 to 9-nerved, 
pointed beyond the fruit; fruit 3 to 3.5 mm. long, about 1.4 mm. wide, narrowly 
ovate, bluntly pointed. 
Type U.S. National Herbarium no. 592748, collected September 24, 1900, Virginia 
Beach, Va., by T. A. Williams (no. 3090). 
This is the species to which the name P. amarum was restricted by Scribner and 
Merrill, @ Nash,® and Hitchcock,¢ when this species and the preceding@ came to 
be regarded as distinct. 
The name here proposed is an attempt to associate this species with the name it 
has so long borne, and also refers to the 
slightly bitter taste of the foliage. 
Fig. 87.—P, amarulum. From type specimen. 
DISTRIBUTION, 
Sandy seashores and coast dunes,, 
Virginia to Florida and west to Louisi- 
ana; also in the Bahamas. 
Vireinia: Norfolk, Kearney 292; 
Ocean View, Kearney 1775, 
Vasey in 1890; Lynn Ha- 
ven, Jfitchcock 440; Virginia 
Beach, /ittchcock 168, Kear- 
ney 2021, 2063, Mackenzie 1725, Williams 3090. 
Frioripa: Indian River, Curtiss 3578; Cape Malabar, Curtiss in 1879; Lake Worth 
Inlet, Curtiss 5527; Sea Breeze, Webber 465; Miami, Chase 3899; Cape Florida, 
Fia. 88.—Distribution of P. amarulum. 
a@U.S8. Dept. Agr. Div. Agrost. Cire, 29: 5. 1901. 
b Britton, Man. ed. 2. 1048, 1905, 
cGray, Man. ed. 7. 104. 1908. 
@ See note under P, amarum Ell, p. 94. 
