PLATE 110. 



URELYTRUM SQTTARROSUM (Hack. Aiidrop. in DC. Monogr. Phau. vi. 272). 



Compactly tufted. CULMS 2-2^ feet long, glabrous, few-noded. Sheaths 

 exceeding the internodes except the uppermost, tight, terete, glabrous, smooth, 

 the lower widened, very firm, shining, persistent, Ligules oblong, 2-3 lines long, 

 glabrous or with a few long hairs behind. Blades very narrow, linear, tapering t 

 a setaceous point, lowest up to 1 foot, by f-l line, flat, convolute, rather rigid, 

 glabrous, prominently nerved and finely scaberulous above. 



KACEMES (false spikes) 5-6 inches long, 1J-2 lines thick, almost glabrous t 

 villous. Joints obliquely truncate, 3-4 lines long, silky at the base, scantily 

 pubescent to villous above, appendage up to 2 lines long, unequally lobed or 

 toothed, ciliolate. 



SPIKELETS heteromorphous, 2-nate (one sessile the other pedieelled) on the 

 verv fragile rhachis of solitary terminal, sub-cylindric spikelike racemes, the 

 sessile deciduous, with contiguous joint of the rhachis and pedicel. ,SVw//V .s-y^v/V/x, 

 florets 2, lower male, upper perfect, about 4 lines long. Glumes, hirer oblong to 

 lanceolate, obtuse to acute, glabrous, smooth or punctate or pubescent to villous, 

 keels 2, acute, at least above, distantly (sometimes obscurely) spinulously nmricate 

 at the middle, rigidly ciliate above, with 1-3 intracarinal nerves which are more or 

 less prominent towards the tips; tipper lanceolate, acute, firmly membranous, 

 3-nerved, side nerves sub-marginal, keel rigidly ciliate above, margins softly ciliate. 

 Valves hyaline, sub-equal, slightly shorter than the glumes, softly ciliate, about 

 3 lines long; lower 2 -nerved, lanceolate, acute; H/I/XT 3-sub-5-nerved, ovate, 

 lanceolate, obtuse to sub-acute, mucronulate. Pales almost equalling their valves, 

 hyaline, 2-nerved. Lodicules 2, cuneate. Stamens 3. Anthers l-i-2 lines long. 

 Stigmas laterally exserted. Pedieelled spikelets varying in hairyness like the 

 sessile, narrow and usually smaller than them, with 2 male florets or (often in the 

 same raceme) more or less reduced, sometimes to an awn representing the lower 

 glume, and a minute rudiment of the upper. Awn squarrose, flattened below, 

 scabrid, lJ-3^ inches long. 



Habitat: NATAL. Near Dundee, W. E. Green 2 ; 2G. 



Figured from Green's specimen, which is the only one in the Government 

 Herbarium. 



The lower floret of the sessile spikelet consists of the lower valve, rudimentary 

 and minute ovary, with stamens and lodicules, and the pale of upper valve is 

 thickened and fleshy below, and hyaline above, and the infolded margins arc 

 auricled at the base. 



A very hard grass. (Mr. Celliers per Mr. W. E. Green). 



>!. 1, riant about natural si/.e : 2, joint of rhachis. Sexxilt- spihclet, 3, lower <flume, 



back view : :5a, same, front view ; 4, upper {flume, side view : 5, lower valve ; 6, pale <>f' 



nine : 7. upper valve : ,x. pale of same ; 9, ovary, remains of filaments and lodicules. 1'fili- 



I tpikete, 10, lower {flume ; 11, upper {flume ; 12, lower valve. E.rcepl Ji<j. 1, all cnlnn/rd. 



