THE GRASSES, MEADOWS, ETC. 97 



CHAPTER VI. 



THE GRASSES, CLOVERS, MEADOWS AND PASTURES 



THE order designated by naturalists as Gramma, is one 

 of the largest and most universally diffused in the vegetable 

 kingdom. It is also the most important to man, and to all 

 the different tribes of graminivorous animals. It includes 

 not only what are usually cultivated as grasses, but also 

 rice, millet, wheat, rye, barley, oats, maize, sugar-cane, 

 broom-corn, the wild cane and the bamboos, the last sometimes 

 reaching 60 or 80 feet in height. They are invariably charac- 

 terized as having a cylindrical stem ; hollow, or sometimes as 

 in the sugar-cane and bamboos, filled with a pith-like sub- 

 stance ; with solid joints and alternate leaves, originating at 

 each joint, and surrounding the stem at their base and form- 

 ing a sheath upwards, of greater or less extent ; and the 

 flowers and seed are protected with a firm, straw-like cover- 

 ing, which is the chaff in the grains and grass seeds, and the 

 husk in Indian corn. They yield large proportions of sugar, 

 starch and fatty matter, besides those peculiarly animal pro- 

 ducts, albumen and fibrin, not only in the seeds, but also, 

 and especially before the latter are fully matured, in the 

 stems, joints and leaves. These qualities give to them the 

 great value which they possess in agriculture. 



Of the grasses cultivated for the use of animals in England, 

 there are said to be no less than 200 varieties ; while in the 

 occupied portion of this country, embracing an indefinitely 

 greater variety of latitude, climate and situation, we hardly 

 cultivate twenty. The number and excellence of our 

 natural grasses, are probably unsurpassed in any quarter of 

 the globe, for a similar extent of country ; but this is a de- 

 partment of our natural history, hitherto but partially ex- 

 plored, and we are left mostly to conjecture, as to their num 

 bers and comparative quality. Their superior richness and 

 enduringness may be inferred, from the health and thrift o 

 the buffalo, deer and other wild herbivorae ; as well as from 

 the growth and fine condition of our domestic animals 

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