Ider grasses. 



PANICUM. 



Mature spikelets falling entire from their pedicels, loosely panicled, solitary 

 2-nate or fascicled on the rhachis of the spike-like branches (false spikes) of a 

 panicle. Upper floret perfect. Lodicules 2, broadly cuneate. Stamens 3. Styles 

 listinct ; stigmas laterally exserted below the tip of the floret. Grain tightly 



nclosed by the hardened valve and pale, oblong or ellipsoid ; hilum basal, puncti- 



L>rm or orbicular ; embryo equalling about half of the grain. 



A large genus, including 200 to 250 species, many of which are valuable 



PLATE 146. 



J AM<-UM HELOPUS (Trin. iii Spreng. Neu. Entdeck, II, 84) var, glabrescens (K. 

 Sebum, in Engl. Pfl. Ost-Afr. C. 101). Fl. Cap. Vol. VII. p. 392. 



ANNUAL. -CuLMs snberect or ascending from a geniculate sometimes decum- 

 3nt and rooting base, 1-2 feet long, glabrous, striate, 4-to-many-noded, branched 

 :>r simple except at the base. 



LEAVES more or less finely hirsute with tubercle-based hairs, rarely glabrescent 

 glabrous ; sheaths rather lax, pubescent to villous at the nodes, ciliate above, 

 jigules very short, membranous, fimbriate. Blades linear-lanceolate to lanceolate 

 >m a broad-rounded or cordate base, acute to acuminate, 2-4 inches long by 3-8 

 les wide, flat, flaccid, margins often wavy, scabrid or fimbriate. 



FALSE SPIKES 3-12, rather distant on a compressed or angular, scabrid or often 

 jubescent, common axis, suberect or spreading, secund, 2-ranked. Rhachis linear, 

 l f-^ line broad, flat on the back, with a very prominent midrib on the face, scabrid 

 or spinulously ciliate, and often with scattered, fine, long, tubercle-based bristles as 

 well. Pedicels usually solitary, very short, stout, scabrid, pubescent, with or with- 

 out 2-3 bristles near the thickened tips. 



SPIKELETS contiguous or subimbricate, ovate to ovate-oblong, acute, 2-2^ 

 lines long, pallid, glabrous. Glumes, lower turned away from the rhachis, broadly 

 ovate, clasping, obtuse, equalling -f-^ of the spikelet, hyaline, 3-5-nerved ; upper 

 membranous, ovate to ovate-oblong, subacute to subacuminate, prominently 7-9- 

 nerved. J^oircr floret male or barren. Valve ovate, acuminate, 5-7-nerved, pale 

 equal, subacute. Perfect floret elliptic, rounded at both ends, li line long, pallid. 

 Valve with a scabrid mucro, up to \ line long, tranversely wrinkled, 5-nerved. 

 Anthers scarcely ^ line long. Grain elliptic, dorsally compressed. Embryo f the 

 length of the grain. 



Habitat: NATAL. Without precise locality Bucli>/nn, 78; near Maritz- 

 burg St. (,'eoiye 17 (Wood 7240). 



Drawn from St. George's specimen, the only one in the Government Herbarium. 



Also in Cape Colony and Orange Free State, Mascarene Islands, East Africa, 

 Abyssinia, and India. The typical form with densely pubescent spikelets has not 

 been found on the African Continent. 



Fig. 1, Lower glume: la. upper glume. Mule flurct 2, lower valve ; ">. pale. I'crfect 

 flurct 4, upper valve, bark view : .'>. same, front view ; <>. pale : 7. stamens, pistil and 

 lodicnles ; 8, rhaeliis with pedicels ; !), ligulc. All rularyrtl. 



