PHLEUM. AIRA. 211 



114. Phleum PRATENSE. Ctmotlju*g;rasg : ^oltJing'^dFtatijtrs!. 

 Common in pastures. June, July. — Agriculturists maintain, erro- 

 neously, that we got this grass from America. " This plant is 

 American and grows in the swampy grounds of Virginia, ■n-ithout 

 cultivation, to a great height. The seeds were carried from Virginia 

 to North Carolina hy one Timothy Hanson, whence its name." Gent. 

 Mag. Tol. 34. p. 230. — Many of the common names of our Grasses, 

 now in use, seem to have been invented by Benjamin Stillingfleet. See 

 his Life and Works by Coke, vol. ii. p. 266. 



115. P. ARENARiUM. Sandy ground near the sea. D. Holy 

 Island. July. 



116. Calamagrostis lanceolata = Arundo calamagrostis. 

 A'^ery rare. N. In a willow brake in the Horse-mire on Doddington 

 moor. July. 



117. Agrostis vulgaris. ^Sfnt^Cjra^:^. Dry heaths and pas- 

 tures, very common. The pretty dwarf variety figured by Lightfoot 

 on the title-page of the 2nd volume of his Flora Scotica, under the 

 name of A. pumila, is common on all our moors. July. — An elegant 

 grass, which, in " saft weather," has its gracile and branched panicle 

 beaded prettily with dewdrops : 



" At dawn, when every grassy blade 

 Droops with a diainoud on its head." — R. Burns. 



It reminds us also of Gray and his Elegy : 



" Oft have we seen him, at the peep of dawn. 

 Brushing, with hasty steps, the dews away. 

 To meet the sim upon the upland lawn ; " 



but our Herds, who are not poetical, complain that the bespangled 

 grass then weets their " shoon " sairly. I have had mine soaked 

 until they were no better than chamois-leather. 



118. A. ALBA. Fiorin-grass. — Curtis, Brit. Grasses, 78: Quart. 

 Rev. i. 351. — Pastures. In damp shady places we meet with a 

 variety which Dr. Parnell names palustris; and the variety stolonifera 

 grows abundantly in wet clayey spots along our sea-board. In moory 

 soil this grass forms a matted turf to the exclusion of other grasses, 

 much deprecated by farmers under the term of the Moor-delf-clod, 

 or Felty-clod. J. Hardy. 



liy. Catabrosa AauATiCA-= Aira aquatica, Sm. — Ditches and 

 watery places, not imcoramon. June. A very pretty grass, with a 

 sweet herbage. 



120. AiRA c^spiTOSA. WLinnd'itVcU : BuU's-faccs". Rough 

 bogs and moist shady places, common. July. — The flowered stems 

 are gathered and dried to be used as an ornament in fire-places. The 

 weary traveller, with a pipe formed of the stalk, slakes his thirst at 

 the scanty and ill-conditioned wells of the moorlands ; and the peat- 

 diggers appease their thirst by chewing the sapid culms of this grass, 

 for the water of the peat-bog they reckon "pushonable." — Grass is 



p2 



