Mr. Woops on the Genera of European Grasses. 5 
supporting the locust or spicule. Other botanists, among whom we may 
reckon Kunth, apply the term axis to the stalk supporting the separate florets 
within the calyx, and it is in this latter sense that I have used it. 
Locusta is the word used by Ray, and adopted by P. de Beauvois and by 
Brown for what Linnæus called spicula, and Sir J. E. Smith a spikelet. I feel 
the want of a word which may be applied with equal propriety to this part in 
the one-flowered grasses as well as in the many-flowered, but am unwilling to 
adopt a term already applied to two distinct objects in natural history. I 
have therefore made use of spPrcura, even when there is only one flower. 
— Guume. According to Linnæus the calyx of grasses is a glume composed of 
two valves. Jussieu also uses the term glume as expressive of the whole organ. 
P. de Beauvois, on the contrary, names the whole tegmen, (or in French, bále,) 
and describes it as consisting of two glumes. Kunth also calls each part a 
glume, and I follow him in this as the most convenient nomenclature. As to 
whether or not it should be considered as a calyx, this must be determined on 
the general principle of applying that term to the common envelope of a com- 
pound flower, or confining it merely to a simple one. If we determine upon 
the latter, we have ready for us the word involucrum; but as some grasses 
have another exterior covering, to which we can hardly apply any other term 
than involucrum, I have preferred following the terminology of Linnæus, 
which is sanctioned by custom, without undertaking to defend its strict pro- 
priety. Some botanists have contended that these glumes are abortive florets, 
and there can be no doubt that in some genera abortive florets do assume 
the appearance of glumes. In Ampelodesmus the inner glume is said some- 
times to become a barren floret. Both circumstances tend to show the close 
affinity of these organs. : | | 
Parea. Within the glumes we arrive at the palee. With Linnæus these 
are the valves of a corolla. This part is called stragulum by P. de Beauvois, 
and said to consist of two paleæ. In the Botanicon Gallicum the term glume 
is applied to the outer coverings, and glumellæ to the interior, and this also 
is the phraseology of Mertens and Koch. Gaudin calls the outer envelope a 
calyx of two paleæ, and the inner a corolla of two paleolæ. I think it an 
objection to these diminutives that the inner covering is very frequently the 
largest. Kunth calls these interior valves paleæ, and this is the expression 
