BKOMUS, Linn. 



SPIKELETS laterally compressed, at least after flowering, variously panicled ; 

 rhachilla disarticulating above the glumes and between the valves. Florets usually 

 numerous, perfect, the uppermost reduced. Glumes more or less unequal, acute to 

 acuminate, persistent, hirer 1 to 7, upper 3 to 9 -nerved, and sometimes mucronate or 

 aristulate. Valves lanceolate or broadly oblong, rounded on the back or keeled, o to 

 13-nerved, usually awned, awn terminal (rarely 3 or 0) or somewhat distant from 

 the often 2 -toothed tip, straight or recurved and then often loosely twisted below, not 

 kneed. Pales entire or bifid, keels usually rigidly ciliate or ciliolate. Lodicules -2, 

 oblong or lanceolate, entire or lobed. . Stamens 3, rarely '2. Ovary obovoid with an 

 often large, villous, 3 or 2 -lobed terminal appendage ; styles short, lateral on the 

 appendage ; stigmas plumose, laterally exserted, or in the eleistogamous species per- 

 manently enclosed. Grain linear to linear-oblong, convexo-concave, and usually 

 adherent to the valve and pile, or at lea,st to the latter : hilum filiform, long ; embryo 

 small. ANNUAL OK PEKKNNIAL of very varying habit ; blades linear, flat, often flaccid ; 

 ligules membranous, hyaline. Panicle contracted, often very dense, or open and even 

 effuse, or reduced to a raceme. Spikelets rather large, erect or pendulous, from ovoid 

 to linear-oblong or linear-cuneate ; awns very long or short, sometimes reduced to a 

 mucro, or 0. 



Species rather numerous, mostly in the temperate regions of the noil hern 

 hemisphere and of South America, several in the high mountains of the tropics. 



PLATE 458. 



BHOMUS MAXIMUS, Desf. (Fl. Cap., Vol. VII.. p. 731). 

 Nat. Order Graminea'. 



ANNUAL. CULMS erect or subascending, geniculate, 1 to '2 feet high, glabrous or 

 pubescent to finely villous in the upper part, 5 to 7-noded, leafy all along, upper inter- 

 nodes usually exserted. 



LEAVES scantily to densely hairy all over or almost glabrous ; sheaths tight, thin, 

 strongly striate ; ligules hyaline, delicate, 2 to 2 lines long, fiinbriate-toothed. 

 Blades linear, tapering to an acute point, 4 to 12 inches by '2 to 4 lines, flat, subflaccid, 

 dark green, margins scaberulous. 



PANICLES erect or slightly nodding, more or less contracted, 4 to 1) inches long 

 (inclusive of the awns), axis terete, striate. scaberulous to hispidulous ; branches 3 to 

 ()-nate, unequal, 2-1- (rarely 3) spiculate, longest 2 to 3 inches long, filiform, flex nous, 

 scabrid to minutely hispid or villous ; lateral pedicels short, rather stout. 



SITKELETS cuneate (when open), \\ to If inch long, green, 5 to 7 -flowered ; 

 rhachilla slender, scabrid, joints 2 to 3 lines long. 



GLUMES subulate to lanceolate-subulate in profile, finely acuminate, green along 

 the nerves, otherwise sea ri us, hirer 1 to sub-3-nerved, 7 to 1(1 lines long, upper 

 broader, 3-nerved, 11 to 14 lines long, keels scabrid. Valves linear-lanceolate, 

 acuminate, about 1 inch long, 7 -nerved, scabrid, upper margins and the finely bifid 

 tips hyaline, white : awn permanently straight, scabrid, 2 to 2 inches long, callus | 

 line long. Pales narrow, about 7 lines long, keels remotely rigidly ciliolate. Stamens 

 3 (in the South African specimens), or 2 ; anthers | to 1 j line long. Ovary pubescent 

 just below the 'appendage. Grain linear, about 7 lines long, strongly convexo-concave. 



A native of the Mediterranean countries and Western Europe. 



H&bit&t : NATAL. ./. tirh<>(iel</ (Government Herbarium 8!*37). 

 Drawn from the specimen sent by Mr. Schofield, the only one in the Herbarium, 

 only 2 stamens were found ; probably introduced. 



Fip 1, Lower plume ; 2, upper plume ; 3, valve ; 4, pale ; 5, pistil, stamens ant] lotUculesj 

 (5, grain. All eiiluri/rd. 



