12 Mr. Woops on the Genera of European Grasses. 
so in all others, it is only a caution to be attended to in all cases, and a com- 
pliance with the very just and important Linnean maxim,—that the genus 
must give the character, but a character does not constitute a genus. 
The general inflorescence of Grasses is very various. Zea is the only genus 
which has any pretence to a place in the Flora of middle Europe, where that 
of the barren* and fertile flowers is different; the former being a terminal 
panicle, the latter an axillary spike. It is even, I believe, the only one where 
. there are fertile florets devoid of anthers. In other genera the spiculæ are 
either scattered in a loose panicle, or in a compact or spike-like one; or they 
are in a real spike or head, in which the florets are tiled equally all round ; 
or they are in opposite rows ; or they are in two rows on the same side of the 
common rachis, which in that case is usually flattened to receive them, and 
more or less triangular. The panicle is also sometimes disposed equally all 
round, or the brànches are placed more on one side than the other, so as to 
leave one part of the circumference destitute of florets. We must add, that 
the spiculæ are either solitary or disposed in pairs or groups, and that in 
these groups the spiculæ are all sessile, or sessile and stalked. The spicula 
themselves are either all perfect, or some barren or neuter, and others per- 
fect, and they contain only one floret and nothing more; or one floret and 
the rudiment of a second; and this rudiment is either below or above the 
perfect floret; or they have two florets, or more than two florets. 
From the eombination of these particulars we find among Grasses the fol- 
lowing modes of inflorescence. 
1. Spiculæ solitary, 1-flowered, or with not more than the stalk-like rudi- 
ment of a second, which, when it occurs, is on the side of the inner or upper 
glume, and therefore the indication of a superior floret, disposed in a panicle 
(either loose or spike-like), equal all round. This is the arrangement in 
Leersia and Oryza, in the PnikiEz of the following pages, in Sripacez, 
Ad ROSTID E, and the one-flowered ARUNDINACE Æ. 
2. Spiculæ 1-flowered, or with only an imperfect external rudiment of a 
second, placed in pairs or groups in a panicle equal all round. This is the 
disposition of the florets in the Lygeum, in the ANDROPOGONEZÆ, (except in 
I use barren to express spicule or florets Vick have onl 
y anthers; fertile, where there are onl 
pistils ; perfect, where there are both; neuter, where there are neither. ; 
