Oplismenus. | GRAMINES. 849 
rhachis glabrous or pilose with spreading hairs. Spikelets small, 
7st in. long, in distant sessile clusters of 2-6 or the uppermost 
solitary, sometimes the lower clusters are produced into a short 
spike-like branch. Hmpty glumes 3, concave, membranous, nerved, 
pilose, the lower one with a stout rigid awn 4-4 in. long. Flowering 
glume pale, coriaceous, nerveless, shining.—O. setarius, Roem. and 
Schult. Syst. ii. 481; Benth. Fl. Austral. vii. 492. O. emulus, 
Kunth, Rev. Gram. 1. 44; Hook. f. Fl. Nov. Zel. i. 292. Ortho- 
pogon emulus, &. Br. Prodr. 194. Panicum imbecille, Trin. Sp. 
Gram. Ic. ii. t. 191; Hook. f. Handb. N.Z. Fl. 323. Hekateros- 
achne elatior, Steud. Syn. Pl. Gram. 118. 
KERMADEC ISLANDS, Norra Istanp: Abundant throughout in shaded low- 
land stations. SourH Isntanp: Recorded from Nelson (ravers) and Canter- 
bury (Lyall), but I have seen no specimens. 
An abundant plant in all warm climates, and barely distinct from the widely 
diffused O. compositus, Beauv. 
7. CENCHRUS, Linn. 
Annual or perennial grasses, usually tall. Leaves flat, flaccid. 
Spikelets narrow, with a single terminal hermaphrodite flower with 
or without a male flower below it, enclosed 1-4 together in an ovoid 
or globose involucre of numerous bristles or spines, the inner of 
which are broad and flattened, connate at the base and hardened in 
fruit; the involucres sessile in a terminal spike or raceme, and 
deciduous with the spikelets. Glumes 4; the outer much the 
smallest, sometimes minute, empty; 2nd equalling the 3rd or a 
little shorter, empty ; 3rd usually containing a palea and sometimes 
3 stamens ; 4th or flowering glume rather shorter than the 3rd and 
more rigid. Stamens 3. Styles often connate at the base. Grain 
enclosed in the flowering glume and palea, free from them. 
Species about 12, in the warm regions of both hemispheres and in temperate 
North America. 
1. C. calyculatus, Cav. Ic. v. 39, t. 463.—Culms tufted, tall, 
stout, glabrous, 2-4 ft. high or more. Leaves long, linear-lanceolate, 
acuminate, 4-2 in. broad, flat, glabrous, scaberulous on the margins 
and veins above ; sheaths long, rather lax ; ligule split into numerous 
fine erect bristles. Spike 5-10 in. long by 4in. broad, stout, dense; 
rhachis angular, pubescent. Involucres about + in. long, sessile or 
very shortly pedicelled, spreading or at length deflexed, broadly 
ovoid ; inner bristles 8-12, connate at the base, compressed, unequal 
in length, sometimes one much longer than the rest, lower 2 plumose 
with soft spreading hairs, upper 4 rough and scabrous; outer 
bristles numerous, much shorter, spreading, subulate, scabrous 
throughout. Spikelets 1 or 2 within the involucres; outer empty 
glume half the length of the 2nd, ovate, acute, 1-nerved; 2nd 
