178 



SOUTH INDIAN GRASSES 



Mnesithea laevis, Kunth. 



This is an erect slender perennial grass with smooth simple or 

 branched stems varying in height from 2 to 4 feet. 



The leaf-sheath is terete, tight, glabrous. The lignle is a short 

 toothed membrane. Nodes are glabrous. 



The leaf-blade is flat, linear from a narrow base, glabrous or base 

 hairy ; apices of upper leaves acuminate, and those of the lower 

 obtuse, with finely serrate margins and a midrib prominent below, 

 6 to 12 inches long and 1/10 to Ye inch wide. 



Racemes are short, exserted from the uppermost sheath, erect, 4 

 to 8 inches long ; joints are 1/5 inch long, contracted in the middle, 

 with two equal and similar spikelets, sunk in the opposite oblong 

 cavities separated by a thin hyaline septum and sometimes with a 

 minute glume of the third spikelet on the upper margin ot the 

 joint. 



Fig. 146. — Maesithea lrevis. 



I and 2. Portions of a spike ; 3, 4, 5 and 6. the first, second, third and the fourth 

 glume, respectively ; 7. palea of the fourth glume ; 8. ovary ; 9 and 10. a part of the 

 spike at the terminal portion. 



The sessile spikelets are i-fiowered, as long as the joint and 

 varying in length from 1/7 to 1/5 inch and have four glumes. The 

 first glume is obliquely oblong, coriaceous, smooth, obtuse, margins 

 narrowly incurved, truncate and pitted at the base, 5- to 7-nerved. 

 The second glume is as long as the first hyaline, oblong and obtuse. 

 The third glume is like the second but thinner and slightly broader, 

 paleate or not, empty. The fourth glume is rather smaller than the 

 third, oblong, obtuse, bisexual and paleate ; the palea is shorter 

 than the glume. Lodicules are not present. 



This grass is usually found in dry fields all over the presidency 

 but it is nowhere abundant. 



Distribution. — Throughout India and Ceylon. 



