- PLATE 154. 



PANICUM ZIZANIOIDES, H.B.K. (Fl. Cap. Vol. Vlf., p. 402). 

 Nat. Order Gramineaj. 



PERENNIAL. CULMS rather slender, firm, ascending from an often long 

 prostrate and rooting base, up to 8 feet long, and to 2 to 4 feet high, glabrous, 

 many-rioded, more or less branched. 



LEAVES, sheaths rather tight or the lower loose and deciduous, striate, glabrous 

 or finely hairy to hirsute in the upper part, margins ciliate ; ligule a cili;ite 

 membranous rim ; blades obliquely erect or spreading, ovate-lanceolate, to lanceolate, 

 rarely linear, from a rounded auricled or cordate base, acuminate or gradually 

 tapering to an acute point, 3 to 7 inches, by j to 1 inch, flat, firm, glabrous, 

 smooth or scantily dotted with small hairs on the upper surface, closely neived and 

 transversely veined near the base when broad, margins cartilaginous, scabrid to 

 spinulous, often fimbriate at the base 



PANICLE erect or slightly nodding, more or less contracted, lax, 4 to 8 inches 

 long ; axis slender, angular, glabrous or pubescent particularly at the nodes, angles 

 smooth or scabrid ; branches 4 to 8, rarely more, usually solitary, distant, suberect, 

 1 to 5 inches long, simple or shortly and sparingly branched from the base or near it, 

 triangular, very slender to filiform, minutely tomentose at the base, internodes '2 to 

 8 lines long; lower pedicels 2-nate, unequal, upper solitary, the longer 1^ to lines 

 long, triangular, scabrid. 



SPIKELETS oblong-ellipsoid, 2 to 3 lines long, turgid, glabrous, smooth, light 

 green, usually obscurely nerved. 



GLUMES oblong, rather firm, subcarinate above, with callous, laterally com- 

 pressed tips, lower shorter by ^ or less, 3-nerved, Hj/jtcr equalling the spikelet, 

 5-nerved Florets, lower male; valve very similar to the upper glume; pa'e 

 equal, acute; perfect floret equalling the ma'e, oblong; valve coriaceous, smooth, 

 shining, straw-coloured or whitish, 5-nerved : pale subauriculate near the base ; 

 anthers 1 line long. 



Habitat: NATAL. Without precise locality, d'cri-nnl 480; Berea, 150 feet 

 alt., March, Wood No. 5941. 



Also in A\ est Africa, India and tropical America. 



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



Fit; 1, Portion of leaf with lig-ule ; 2, lower glume, liaek view ; .'!, upper g-lumo, back 

 view : 4. lower valve, line)- view ; ;~>, pale ; (i, stamens and lodirul'-s ; 7. upper valve ; 8, pale ; 

 9, pistil, stamen;; and lodieules. AH enlari/eil. 



