1911] Chase,— Subterranean Organs of Cinna arundinacea 9 
THE SUBTERRANEAN ORGANS OF CINNA ARUNDINACEA. 
AGNES CHASE. 
(Plate 85.) 
In October of 1910, Mr. Thomas L. Cooper of Decatur, Georgia, 
sent to the Department of Agriculture a box containing clusters of 
moniliform underground organs with young plants attached by 
thread-like rootstocks. These were identified as belonging to some 
grass, the “bulbs” being much swollen and greatly shortened inter- 
nodes, the constricted portion being the node, but we knew of no grass 
having such an underground habit. When shown the specimens 
on his return from Mexico Prof. Hitchcock suggested Cinna arundi- 
nacea L. as the species producing the curious organs. Herbarium 
specimens of this species showed many of the culms to have slightly 
swollen bases. 
Late in November a colony of Cinna in Virginia near the Potomac 
River was visited and specimens secured with clustered culms, each 
with a swollen corm-like base, as in Panicum bulbosum, and, less 
conspicuously, in several species of Melica. These swollen bases 
consisted of one to three (mostly one) internodes, constricted at the 
node above and below. No moniliform organs were found, but the 
soil was a heavy clay and it is possible the delicate connecting runners 
were broken, nor was the colony a large one. The specimens secured, 
however, served to identify the species with those sent from Georgia. 
A second supply of the underground organs attached to more devel- 
oped plants was kindly sent by Mr. Cooper in December. The soil 
surrounding them was loose and sandy which may account either for 
the great development of these organs or for their being obtained 
attached to the plants. 
These may be regarded as corms, constricted at the joints. They 
consist of ‘two to five joints, 5 to 10 mm. in the greatest diameter, and 
produce rootlets and rootstocks or runners from the nodes. It is 
not certain how these moniliform corms are formed but they would 
seem to be the bases of old culms from which the aerial portion has 
entirely disappeared, since each is tipped by a very hard remnant of 
apparently an unswollen joint. Sometimes two or three of these 
moniliform corms are united in a cluster by very short rootstocks. 
