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Grlumes thinly scarious, two outer empty ones nearly equal, acute ; 
flowering glumes close above them, shorter, thin and hyaline, finely 
pointed or shortly bifid, with a fine awn dorsally attached below the 
middle, and twisted at the base. 
Palea two-nerved. 
Styles short, distinct. 
Grain enclosed i in, and more or less adnate to, the very thin glume 
and palea. 
1, Aira caryophyllea, Linn. 
Botanical name.—Aira. Dioscorides called a grass by this name, 
but the origin of the word is doubtful. Linneeus adopted this name, 
though the grass is not identical with that of Dioscorides. Caryo- 
phylle -a—Latin, a clove gilly-flower, having foliage resembling that of 
a pink. 
Botanical description (B. Fl., vii, 585).—A slender, elegant, tufted 
annual, rarely above 6 inches high. 
Leaves short and fine. 
Panicle loose and spreading, the capillary branches in pairs or threes. 
Spikelets erect, silvery-shining. 
Outer glumes 1 to 1% lines long, almost scarious, very acute. 
Flowering glumes shorter, the “dorsal awn projecting about a line beyond the outer 
glume. 
Value as a fodder igictiens. 
Habitat and range.—Found in Tasmania, Victoria, and New South 
Wales. In the last named Colony it has been recorded from the 
Mudgee district. It is a native of most temperate countries. 
DESCHAMPSIA. 
Spikelets two-flowered, in a loose or rarely contracted panicle with 
slender branches, the rhachis of the spikelet articulate, hairy, more or 
less produced between the floweri ing glumes and beyond the upper one 
as a hairy bristle, or rarely bearing a terminal empty glume. 
Glumes keeled, with thinly scarious sides, two outer empty ones 
rather acute ; flowering glumes obtuse or truncate, and more or less 
four-toothed, with a fine dorsal awn attached below the middle, the 
lowest close above the empty glumes, the upper raised on a stipes (the 
rhachis of the spikelet). 
Palea prominently two-nerved, often two-toothed. 
Styles short, distinct. 
(rrain enclosed in the glume and palea, usually free from them. 
Perennial grasses with the shining spikelets of V'risetum and Aira, 
usually smaller than in the former, larger than in the latter genus. 
1. Deschampsia cespitosa, Beauy. 
Botanical names.—Deschampsia, after M. H. Deschamps, a French 
chemist (? naturalist), who accompanied La Perouse’s disastrous 
expedition. Ceaspitosa, a Latin adjective derived from cxspes, a turf 
or sod, 
