AXONOPUS (BEAUV.), HOOK. F. 

 Nat. Order Gramineae. 



SPIKELETS ovate to lanceolate-oblong, mucronate or awned, slightly or con- 

 spicuously compressed from the back, falling entire from the solitary, geminate or 

 fascicled (and then very unequal) pedicels of more or less digitate or vvhorled 

 racemes. Florets, lower male, upper perfect. 



GLUMES unequal, lower smaller, hyaline, 3 to 1 -nerved, mucronate, acute or 

 acuminate, upper equal or subequal to the spikelet, membranous, 5-nerved, 

 mucronulate or inuticous, submarginal nerves densely villous or ciliate. Valves 

 subequal, lower resembling the upper glume, shortly or scantily villous or glabrous, 

 upper chartaceous, glabrous or scantily ciliate, 5-nerved, produced into a mucro in- 

 short awn. Pales dissimilar, of the lower floret very short, hyaline, 2-partite, 

 flaps auricled ; of the perfect floret more or less equalling the valve, entire, 

 2-keeled, flaps very narrow, broadly auricled near the base. Lodicu'es 2, broadly 

 cuneate. Stamens 3, styles distinct ; stigmas laterally exserted. Grain enclosed 

 by the rigid valve and pale, oblong, piano convex ; embryo about half the length 

 of the grain ; hilum basal, punctifbrm. 



PLATE 166. 



AXONOPUS SEMIALATITS, Hook. f. var Ecklonii, Stapf. (Fl. Cap. Vol. 



VII., p 418). 



PERENNIAL, compactly tufted. CULMS erect, 1 to 3 feet long, glabrous or 

 more or less hairy, usually 2-noded with upparmost intern ode long exserted. 

 Sheaths strongly striate, rather tight, more or less hairy, lowest fugaciously tomen- 

 tose, firm, persistent ; ligules very short, truncate. Blades linear from a slightly 

 or distinctly narrowed base, acute, 3 to 12 inches, by 2 to 3 lines, flat, firm, rigid, 

 strongly and closely nerved, softly hirsute with tubercle-based hairs. 



RACEMES 2 to 5, digitate or subdigitate, suberect, usually straight, rather 

 stout and dense, often subsecund, 1 \ to 3 inches long, rarely longer, subsessile or 

 some distinctly peduncled ; rhachis slender, angular, hairy, at least below, pedicels 

 mostly 2-nate, angular, scabrid or pubescent, very short, up to 2 lines long. 



SPIKELETS ovate-oblong, 2J to 3 lines long, very slightly compressed, light 

 green, usually tinged with purple or quite purplish. 



GLUMES lower ovate, mucronulate, J to f the length of the spikelet, glabrous 

 or minutely pubescent at the tip ; upper ovate-oblong, densely villous along 

 the margins ; valve of male floret finely woolly above, near the margins, of the 

 perfect florect oblong, scantily and finely ciliate, produced into a fine mucro or short 

 awn (up to l line long). Anthers up to if line lon^. 



Habitat : NATAL. Umpumulo to Riet Vlei, 2000 to 5000 feet alt,, Buchanan 

 180; near Durban, Krau*s 55 ; Inanda, 1800 feet alt., Wood 1593; Polela, 6000 

 to 7000 feet alt., Evans 521 ; and without precise locality, Gerrard 470. 



Also in India. Drawn from Wood's 1593. 



Fig. 1, Lower glume ; 2, upper glume ; 3, lower valva ; 4, pale ; 5, stamens and lodicules ; 

 6, upper valve ; 7, pale ; 8, pistil, stamens and lodieules. All enlurtjcd. 



