﻿Nash : Genus Syntherisma in North America 303 



and Mexico ; also from Missouri and Kansas southward. While 

 this approaches in some of its forms 5. sanguinalis, it can readily 

 be separated by its longer narrower and more acute spikelets 

 with their more copious pubescence, the longer second scale, and 

 the smooth nerves. 



12. Syntherisma barbata (Willd.). 



Digitaria barbata Willd. Enum/ Hort. Berol. 91. 1809. 

 Panicum barbatum Kth. Enum. PL 1 : 84. 1833. 



Culms 5 dm. or less long, decumbent at the base and often 

 rooting at the lower nodes, branching, smooth and glabrous ; 

 nodes several : culm leaves several ; sheaths flattened, keeled, 

 short, smooth and glabrous ; ligule a membranous ring about 1.5 

 mm. long, truncate and irregularly toothed at the apex ; blades 



lanceolate, 3 cm. or less long, 3-5 mm. wide, flat, more or less 



( r 



spreading, glabrous and smooth on both surfaces, or the upper 

 surface a little rough, the margins rough, sparsely ciliate at the 

 base : panicle long exserted ; racemes in pairs, 4-6 cm. long 

 I'ect or ascending, the rachis 3 -angled, the lateral angle 

 ringed, the wings about .2 mm. wide and'hispidulous on the mar- 

 ins: spikelets 3.5-4 mm. long, slightly exceeding 1 mm. in 

 breadth, lanceolate, acute, in pairs, on 3 -angled pedicels, the an- 

 gles hispidulous ; outer scales empty, the first scale minute, tri- 

 angular, glabrous, the second and third scales pubescent with very 

 Jong hairs, the second scale about four-fifths as long as the spikelet, 

 lanceolate-cuneate, 3 -nerved, the appressed pubescence, consisting 

 of hairs thickened at the apex, on the margins and internerves, the 

 third scale 7-nerved, in the short -pedicelled spikelet the pubes- 

 cence, which is similar to that on the first scale, confined to the 

 margins only, in the long-pedicelled spikelets the pubescence on the 

 Margins and also on the second internerve on each side, and on 

 the internerve also a row of much coarser subulate hairs, the 

 pubescence of the internerves finally widely spreading, the fourth 

 c ale yellowish white at maturity, elliptic-lanceolate, acuminab ; 

 Palet of equal Length and similar texture. 



£ 



Introduced into Mississippi. Collected at Starkville by Pro- 



glab 



J 



rum. 



