PLATE 447. 



EHRHARTA CALYCINA, Sm.^ (Fl. Cap., Vol. VII, p. 674). 

 Nat. Order Gramine;e. 



PERENNIAL, tufted, rarely stolon iferous CULMS usually geniculate, slender, 

 simple or scantily branched, I to 2 feet long, smooth, glabrous, very rarely minutely 

 villous below, 4 to 6-noded ; sheaths glabrous, rarely reversedly pubescent, rather 

 tight ; ligules very short, truncate, denticulate ciliate ; blades linear from a 

 clasping often denticulate and ciliate base, long and gradually tapering or shortly 

 acute, rarely subobtuse, 1 to 4 inches, by 1 to % lines, flaccid or rigid, flat or 

 involute to setaceous, glaucous, scaberulous, glabrous or hairy, margins sometimes 

 wavy, scabrid. 



PANICLE very narrow, nodding, 3 to 9 inches long, subsecund, rhachis flexuous, 

 smooth ; branches in distant semivvhorls, very unequal, the longest rarely more 

 than 1 inch long, simple or scantily branched, spreading or erect, subcapillary, 

 flexuous, smooth. 



SPIKELETS pallid, rarely purplish, oblong, 2J to 3 lines long. 



GLUMES subequal, narrow-oblong, acute or subobtuse, 7-nerved. Valves. 

 empty ones unequal, loosely villous, lower very narrow, linear-oblong, acute, as 

 long as the lower glume or shorter, sub-5-nerved, shortly bearded at the base in 

 front, the upper oblong, obtuse, mucronate (inucro up to ^ line long), as long as 

 the upper glume or longer, 5-nerved, with 2 large semi-lunar appendages at the 

 base, beardless ; fertile valve oblong, obtuse, slightly shorter than the upper empty 

 valve, glabrous or scantily hairy, obscurely 5 to 7-nerved ; lodicules glabrous. 

 Stamens G, anthers H line long; stigmas brush-like: grain li line long. 



Habitat: NATAL. Sand dunes near the mouth of the Umla/.i Uiver, /vm. 

 414 ; Clairmont, 50 feet alt., Wood 7261. 



" A very polymorphic species, of which Nees distinguishes ( varieties and 

 several sub-varieties ; but the characters used by him are so uncertain that I find 

 it useless to retain his sulxlivisions." 



Fig 1, Lower glume ; 2, upper "liiinc ; 3, 1st valvo : 4. 2nd valve in profile ; .">, fertile 

 valve ; (>, pale ; 7, pistil, stamens and lodicules. //// 



