HOUTUS GRAMINEUS WOBURNENSIS. 119 



LATHYRUS pralet/sis. Yellow Vetchling, Tare Ever- 

 lasting. 



Specific character : Tendrils with two leaves, quite simple; 



leaflets spear-shaped. 

 Tendrils sometiaies three-cleft. Native of Britain. Root 



creeping. Perennial. 

 Experiments. — At the time of flowering, the produce from 



a clayey loam is 24,502 lbs. per acre. 



The merits of this vetchling, in point of produce and nu- 

 trient qualities, appear to be much inferior to those of the 

 red or broad-leaved cultivated clover. 



It is not unfrequent in good pastures and in rich mea- 

 dows : it delights in moisture, and it attained to the greatest 

 perfection in a tenacious clayey soil. It is a late-springing 

 plant, and the shoots come up thinly, but attain to a great 

 length. It appears to be eaten by oxen, cows, and sheep, 

 but with less relish than they seem to have for the Vicia 

 scpiiim (creeping vetch), or the red and white clovers. 



Sir Humphry Davy has shown, that the plants most liked by 

 cattle have either a saline or subacid taste, as in the instances, 

 of red and white clovers, and the superior grasses. This 

 plant, however, has a greater excess of the bitter extractive 

 and saline matters, in proportion to that contained in these 

 plants, when compared to the rest of the pasture grasses. 

 It is nauseous to the taste. From these facts and observa- 

 tions, it does not seem to be a plant that possesses unequi- 

 vocal merits for admission into the composition of pasture. 

 It attains to the greatest size on tenacious clayey soils. 



POA nervata. Nerved meadow-grass. 



Specific character: Panicle upright; spikelets smooth, 

 five-flowered, nerved- 



Obs. — Panicle often half a foot and more in length, with 

 slender branches, pressed close, and subdivided; spike- 

 lets small, of a green colour; valves of the blossom 

 smooth, having five raised nerves on each valve ; leaves 



