r 



152 TRIANDRIA. DIGYNIA. Festuca. 



About 16 inches high. Panicle 5 or 6 inches long, slightly 

 curved* Spikets from 4, to 8 or 10 flowered. Cal. very unequal, 

 the smaller valve hardly } ; the size of the larger. Bloss. valves 

 rough. Awn full twice the length of the blossom. Stamen only 



one. 



Wall Fescue. Capons-tail Grass. Walls and dry barren 

 places. [On the road side leading from Blymhill to Shrewsbury.. , 

 Mr. Dickenson.] A. May, June. 



(2) Panicle pointing oneway] awn's shorter than the blossom. 



ovi'na. F. Panicle compact, awned : straw four-cornered, almost 



naked: leaves bristle-shaped. 



E. hot. 585-Mus* rust. iv. 2. \-Leers 8. 3 and 4-S 'tilling/. 

 8-Scheucb. 6. 6-Mont. 5. 



From 5 to 8 inches high, but twice as tall when cultivated. 

 Panicle \~ to 2 inches long, mostly pointing one way. Spikets 

 from 3 to 5-fiowered, but generally 4 , and an imperfect rudiment 

 of a fifth. CaL one valve only | the length of the other. Awns of 

 various lengths, but generally about \ the length of the blossom. 



Var. 2. awned. Leers §.3~-Scheuch.6. S-Mont.5-Stillingf.S. 



Var. 3. Awnless. See F. tenuifolia. 



Var. \. Viviparous. Scheuch.pr. 1 . ( 2-Ray Sjn.22.1.Barr.<27<2. 



Mr. Gougk informs me that vegetating germs of the vivipa- 

 rous variety, brought from High-street, the highest hill in West- 

 moreland, and planted in his garden in the year 1790, still con- 



tinue viviparous, and were so even in tiie dry month ot July 

 1794- He says also that he has found plants in the valley with 

 vegetating germs on them, and from these circumstances he con- 

 cludes that there is either a constitutional difference between the 

 F. ovina and the F. vivipara, or else that the plant is uniformly 

 viviparous, which he proposes as a subject of future enquiry. 

 Linnaeus also calls it a permanent variety, and observes that it 

 retains its character when transplanted into a garden. Dr. Sib- 

 thorpe considers the awnless var. also as a distinct species, and 

 in his Fl. oxon. characterizes it thus. F. tenuifolia. Panicle 

 pointing one way, awnless : leaves hair-like, longish, rather up- 

 right : straw naked. 



Plui. 34. 2. 



Gramen capillaceum, locustellis pennatis, non aristatis. Ray 



Syu. 4tl\). Bullington Green. Dry gravelly soil, and on stone 

 waUs. [3. On the summits of Skiddaw and Ingleborough. 

 "Woodw. — 1. Wickcliffs. Mr. Swayne. — 4-. Crib y Ddeseil. 

 Mr. Griffith. P. June.* 



* It flourishes best in a dry sandy soil : cows, horses, and goats will 



cat it, but it is the favcurite food of sheep : they prefer it before all other 



grasses, 



