194 HORTUS GRAMINKUS WOBU RN F.N SIS, 



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

 a heath loam is 6,806 lbs. per acre. 



The latter-math produce of this grass is very small. It 

 is common to heaths and by the margins of bogs, but is 

 never found in the bogs themselves, as it affects a dry soil. 

 The nutritive matter offers no reason for the dislike mani- 

 fested by animals for the grass, as its composition is much 

 the same as that of the aira jlexnosa, which is eaten with 

 relish by sheep ; the only difference is in the proportion of 

 sugar: the airajlexuosa having more of this constituent and 

 less of mucilage than the nardiis slricta. But the extreme 

 hard and wiry nature of the foliage explains the cause. 

 That property is so strong in this grass that, in the ordinary 

 way, a scythe is passed amongst it without having the effect 

 of dividing a single leaf; and from this it may easily be con- 

 ceived how ungrateful it must prove to the mouths of cattle. 

 Were it not for this circumstance, and its continuing to send 

 up flowering culms all the summer, it would be the most 

 ornamental grass for forming grass-plats, as its colour is of 

 the finest dark green, being superior in this respect to all 

 the perennial grasses. Linnaeus observes, that goats and 

 horses eat it, and that sheep are not fond of it. Crows stock 

 it up for the sake of the larvae of some species of tipulae 

 which they find at the root. 



It flowers in the first and second weeks of July, and the 

 seed is ripe about the first week of August. 



CYNODON dactylon. Creeping Dog s-tooth Grass. 



Durva, Dub, or Doob-grass of the Hindoos. Panicum 

 dactylon. Creeping Panic-grass. Digitaria stolonif'era. 

 Creeping Finger-grass. 



Specific character : Spikes four or five, crowded together ; 

 corolla smooth. 



Refer. — Fig. i. Corolla, natural size. L*. Floret, magni- 

 fied. 3. Calyx, magnified. 4. Germen, and feathery 

 stigmas. 5. A seed, the natural size. 6. A seed, 

 magnified. 



A. B. Lambert, Esq. in the Transactions of the Linnean 



