504 



He distributed them according to their outward appear- 

 ances, but distinctive characters failed him. Neither was 

 Tournefort, however great a botanist, equal to the arrange- 

 ment of this tribe. Monti .followed Ray, but investigated 

 such only as were natives of Italy. John Scheuchzer, 

 first induced by Sherard, paid a most laborious attention 

 to this subject, collecting grasses from all quarters, and 

 describing them with the greatest exactness ; but he was 

 deficient in technical terms, and his very long descriptions 

 are nearly all alike, till he arrives at the flowering part. 

 The terms which he uses are folliculus for the corolla, 

 gluma for the calyx, locusta for the spikelet contained in 

 the latter. After him Micheli contrived a new method, 

 dividing grasses according to their spikelets, which he 

 observed to be either compound or simple. He subdi- 

 vided them by their flowers being united or separated ; 

 and subjoined an order of plants "akin to grasses," which 

 really do not belong to them. If their sexes be attended 

 to, the arrangement of grasses becomes less difficult. They 

 are either monandroiis, diandrous, triandrous, or hexan- 

 drous. The two latter have either united, monoecious or 

 polygamous flowers." 



"The inflorescence in this order of plants is either 

 spiked or panicled. Their spike, properly so called, con- 

 sists of several flowers, placed on an alternately toothed 

 rachis, or stalk. If such a rachis be conceived perfectly 

 contracted, it will become a toothed common receptacle, 

 as in compound flowers, so that grasses may thus be dis- 

 tinguished into simple and compound. Or if we imagine 

 all the flowers to be sessile on one common base, such 

 grasses as are properly spiked will have a scaly receptacle, 

 the rest a naked one, according to the analogy of the syn- 

 genesious class ; and by this means the corn family may 

 be separated from the rest, for they are scaly. 



" The calyx is a husk of two valves, one proceeding 

 from within the base of the other, like the claw of a crab. 

 These husks arc concave, and truly the leaves of the plant 



