116 Rhodora [May 
Connecticut: Norwich, rocky woods. Lamb’s Hill, 15 C. B. 
Graves, July 1, 1899. 
The puberulent culms and nodes bearded with ascending or ap- 
pressed hairs, as well as the characters presented by the panicle and 
spikelets suggest a very close relationship with Panicum commu- 
latum, in fact P. bicknellii might with some propriety be treated as 
a narrow-leafed variety of that species. 
24. PANICUM COMMUTATUM R. & S. Syst. 2: 242. 1817. (P. ner- 
vosum Muhl. Gram. 117. 1817; P. asAei Pearson in Ashe, Journ. 
E. Mitch. Soc. 15: 35. 1898. 
A more or less caespitose, erect, and finally branching perennial 
with rather stout culms 3 to ro dm. high, broad lanceolate leaves, and 
diffuse panicles. Culms glabrous or puberulent; nodes glabrous or 
pubescent with erect hairs. Sheaths striate, generally shorter than 
the leaf-blades, the margins more or less ciliate otherwise glabrous 
or with a more or less densely pubescent ring on the back at the 
apex; ligule very short, minutely ciliate; blades more or less 
cordate-clasping at the base, 5-13 cm. long, less than 1 cm. to nearly 
3 cm. broad (usually about 6 cm. long by 1 cm. broad); margins 
scabrous, ciliate towards the base, surfaces glabrous, long-acuminate 
pointed. Basal leaves 3-10 cm. long and 1-2 cm. wide, usually 
nearly as broad as long. Panicles broadly ovate or pyramidal, 
5-12 cm. long; branches spreading, more or less flexuous, rather 
few-flowered, glabrous or nearly so. Spikelets oblong, obtuse, 2.5-3 
mm. long; first glume one fourth to one third as long as the second, 
obtuse, nerveless; second and third glumes pubescent or thinly 
pilose, 7-nerved, as long as or slightly exceeding the smooth and obtuse 
fourth glume. 
General distribution: Southern New England, and New York 
southward to Florida and westward to Mississippi and Missouri. 
MASSACHUSETTS: Melrose, W. P. Rich, July 3, 1892, 291 W. P. 
Rich, July 21, 1894, and 235a, June 16, 1895; Boston, rocks near 
Muddy-pond woods, C. W. Swan, June 5,1894; Blue Hill, W. 7. 
Manning, Aug. 23, 1894; Weston, Æ. F. Williams, Sept. 29, 1895; 
West Quincy, J. A. Churchill, Sept. 9, 1894. CONNECTICUT: Mont- 
ville, 88 C. B. Graves, June 19, 1897. 
This species varies a good deal in its habit of growth, some forms 
being slender, others quite robust. The leaves also vary a good deal 
in width, but in all they are many-nerved and glabrous except as 
above indicated. The sheaths are nearly always glabrous, but in a 
few southern forms the upper portion of the sheath is somewhat 
pilose with appressed hairs. The ring of pubescence at the summit 
of the sheath on the back is quite characteristic of this species. In 
the type the culms are glabrous as are the nodes, but in the form 
which extends into New England ranging southward to ‘Tennessee 
and Florida the culms, at least the lower internodes, are puberulent, 
