PLATE No. 401. 



ARISTIDA BARBICOLLIS, Triii. and Rupr. (Fl. Cap., Vol. VII., p. 559), 



Nat. Order Graminese. 



PERENNIAL, tufted, light green to glaucous, glabrous except at the moaths of 

 the sheaths. 



CTLMS slender, rather wiry, more or less compressed below, geniculately 

 ascending or suberect, J to Ij foot long, simple or scantily branched from some of 

 the lower nodes, smooth, 2-3-noded ; sheaths tight, smooth ; ligule a dense line of 

 short hairs passing into beards or a ring of long hairs at the mouths of the 

 sheaths : blades usually very narrow, linear, acute, l-o inches by f to I line, folded ; 

 convolute, curved, rigid or flat and then often twisted or curled, smooth below, 

 scabrid above. 



PANICLE ovate to oblong, 2-6 inches long ; rhachis straight or fiexuous, smooth ; 

 branches solitary, distant, filiform, spreading, flexuous or straight, scaberulous, 

 dense, spike-like from ^ to Ij inch above the base ; pedicels very short. 



SPIKELETS 3j lines long. 



GLUMES keeled, the lower lanceolate, shortly mucronate,2 lines long, keels smooth 

 or scabrid, the v.j>j>er linear, emarginate, mucronate, 3j lines long. Valve linear, 

 produced into a short, stout, tightly twisted beak, somewhat shorter than the upper 

 glume, minutely scaberulous below the beak ; callus less than |- line long ; awns 

 jointed with the valve, not disarticulating, tine, 5-9 lines long ; pale, lodicules, 

 stamens and grain as in A. conyexta. 



NATAL. Near Durban, Williamson ; near Tugela, 4000 feet, 

 2i?0 ; near Tugela, Wood 3588 ; near Colenso, 3000 feet, Wood 4418; 

 Umsinga and base of Biggarsberg, Buchanan !)0; without precise locality, (f'irar</ : 

 Zululand, ./otl.-iiixon 40 (Wood 7305); Zululand, Jcnkinson 64 (Wood 7339); 

 ( ,'cri-ih-il and McKvn 167. 



Drawn from Wood's 3588, and compared with 4418. 



The Flora Capensis says : "Very close to A. coiif/extft, but the branches of 

 the panicle are more numerous and longer, the spikelets a little larger, and the 

 i mouth of the sheaths is distinctlv bearded, the beards sometimes uniting into a 

 ring at the junction of the blade and the sheath.' 



Jenkinson says : " Native name N'gongoni, used for brushes, grows in dry, 

 exposed situations on poor soil, has long roots, stands drought well, first green in 

 spring, last to dry up, very wiry and of little value for stock." 



Fig 1, LO\YCT glume : 2, upper glume ; 3, valve ; 4, pale : 5, pistil, stamens and lodicules. 

 \AII c/ilurt/cd. 



