HOLCUS LANATUS. 
Linnzvs. SmitH. Parnett. Hooker anp Arnott. LInpDtLey. 
Kocu. Hupson. Witnertnc. Hutt. Rentnan. ABsBor. 
SrptHorr. Curtis. Dickson. ReicHEeNBacH. Bapineton. WILLDENOW. 
Kwapp. Sincnuarr. Leers. Host. Scuraprer. ScHREBER. 
PLATE XXVII. 
The Meadow Soft Grass. 
Holcus—To extract. Lanatus—W oolly. 
A PRODUCTIVE Grass, easily cultivated, yet cattle do not like 
it. It seems to delight to grow in shady situations, especially 
in light moist soils. 
Common throughout Great Britain and Scotland, France, Italy, 
and Germany. 
This very beautiful Grass has an upright circular stem, 
bearing four or five pale green, flat, broad, acute, soft, hairy 
leaves, with soft downy sheaths, the upper sheath extending 
considerably beyond its leaf; inflated and having at its apex an 
obtuse membranous sheath. Joints four, hairy. Inflorescence 
compound-panicled, green, red, or pink in colour. Panicle up- 
right, triangular in shape, compact and close when young, and 
spreading when more mature. Branches hairy. Spikelets pen- 
dulous. ‘Two florets, the upper one awned. Calyx consisting 
of two hairy membranous glumes, the upper one oblong, tipped 
with a minute bristle. Keel hairy, having a green rib on either 
side; lower glume crescent-shaped, and destitute of lateral ribs. 
Two equal-sized palee. Upper floret smallest, and elevated on 
a lengthy naked footstalk, having a dorsal awn of about half 
the length of the palea, commencing a little beneath the apex, 
