GRASSES OF SCOTLAND. 9 



in the United States. Its most southern Urait seems to be about la- 

 titude 40. Flowers in the first and second weeks of July, and ripens 

 its seed about the first week in August It has occasionally been 

 found at an elevation of nearly 4000 feet above the sea. 



2. ROTTBOLLIA INCURVATA. * 



Hard Sea- Grass. 



Specific Characters. — Stem round. Spike curved. (Plate 11.) 



Description. — It grows from three to six inches in length. The 

 root is annual, fibrous. Stem round, smooth, striated and polished, 

 decumbent at the base, and bent at the joints ; bearing six or seven 

 leaves, with smooth, striated sheaths more or less inflated, crowned 

 with a very short obtuse ligule. Joints smooth, the lower ones often 

 throwing out lateral shoots. Leaves narrow, acute, smooth and in- 

 volute. Inflorescence spiked. Spike cylindrical, elongated, curved. 

 Spikelets alternately disposed along the rachis ; of one, sometimes 

 two awnless florets. Calyx of two flattish, lanceolate, acute, four- 

 ribbed glumes, (Fig. 1.) placed in front of the rachis, mostly close, but 

 spreading while in flower. Florets of two paleae (Fig. 2.) rather shorter 

 than the glumes ; membranous, linear, without ribs or awns ; entire 

 at the margins. Scales acute. Filaments capillary. Anthers pen- 

 dulous, cloven at each end. Ovarium oblong, obtuse, in one floret 

 only. Styles short Stigmas feathery, widely spreading. Seed 

 elliptic, oblong, shut up in the cavity of each joint of the rachis by 

 the closed glumes. 



Jiliformis. A slender upright variety, with the stem 



somewhat compressed. (Plate III.). Foimd in salt marshes near 

 Aberlady. 



Ohs. — This grass grows in salt marshes along the coast, but is of 

 no agricultural use. It is found on the east and west coasts of Scot- 

 land, but does not exist either in the Orkney or Shetland Isles, or 

 further north than latitude 5Q. In England it grows along the shores 

 of Northumberland, Durham, Flint, Denbigh, Anglesea, Gloucester, 

 Norfolk, Essex, Kent, Sussex, Somerset, Devon. It is frequent along 



" RoUboUia incurzata, Linn. Smith, Hooker. Ophiurus incurvatim, Beauv., Lindley. 

 Ltpturus incurvatus, Koch. 



