326 GRAMINEJ3. Elymus. 



front of each spikelet, together forming an involucre to the cluster. Lower palet 

 mostly coriaceous, 5-nerved, rounded on the back, acute or awned at apex, stamens 3. 

 Scales ovate, usually ciliate. Ovary hairy : stigmas sessile or nearly so, distant. 

 Grain adherent to the palets. 

 A genus of perennials belonging to northern temperate regions, the number of species about 25. 



* Glumes shorter than the spikelet : lower palet cuspidate, or (in one variety) 



awn-pointed, but not long- awned. 



1. 33. arenarius, Linn. Culms 3 to 8 feet high, glaucous : leaves strict, acumi- 

 nate, pungent, 6 lines broad, uppermost very short ; sheaths auriculate at throat ; 

 ligule very brief: spike 6 to 12 inches long, dense, strict, the rhachis hirsute ; spike- 

 lets an inch long, closely imbricated, appressed, pubescent, awnless, mostly 3-flow- 

 ered : glumes acuminate, 3 5-nerved : lower palet keeled toward the cuspidate tip, 

 hirsute, ciliate, the upper equalling it. Reichenb. Icon. Fl. Germ. t. 116 ; Torr. in 

 Pacif. R. Rep. vi. 92. 



Pitt River (Ncwberry) ; Oregon (Pickering) ; Washington Territory, Cooper. Reported as com- 

 mon in the northern parts of the State ; not found in the Eastern States, but common in Europe 

 and northern Asia. The spikes are sometimes purplish. The seeds are used as food by the 

 Digger Indians, and as it springs up around deserted lodges is called by the inhabitants " Ran- 

 cheria-Grass." E. mollis, Trin. (not of R. Br.), closely resembles this, and is found far northward 

 and also eastward. It is distinguished by its softer and more downy spikelets, and its much 

 broader 5-7-nerved glumes. 



2. E. condensatus, Presl. Culms from 2 to 6 feet high or more, with ample 

 mostly flat leaves, smooth except on the margins, and as well as the sheaths mostly 

 glaucous, auriculate at the junction with the sheath ; ligule a short rigid fringe : 

 spike 5 to 15 inches long, dense or interrupted, simple or frequently made up of 

 fascicled short few-flowered branches ; spikelets 3 - 6-flowered : glumes subulate- 

 setaceous, shorter than the spikelet : floret mostly membranous ; lower palet 5-nerved 

 above, mucronate-pointed or somewhat 3-toothed ; upper palet equalling the lower, 

 2-toothed above. Rel. Hsenk. i. 265 ; Boland. in Trans. Calif. Agric. Soc. 1864-65, 

 143 ; Watson, Bot. King Exp. 391. 



Var. triticoides. Spike mostly simple ; spikelets smaller, 2 or 3 or sometimes 

 only 1 at each joint of the rhachis : florets of firmer texture and sometimes awn- 

 pointed or short-awned. E. Virginicits, var. submuticus, Hook. Fl. Bor.-Am. ii. 255. 

 E. triticoides, Nutt. in Herb. Phil. Acad. ; Buckl. in Proc. Phil. Acad. 1862, 99. 



Fort Tejon (Xantiis) ; San Jnan (Brewer) ; Monterey and San Francisco (Bolandcr) ; Oregon 

 Boundary (Lyall) ; and frequent through Nevada to Colorado. The variety from Mohave River 

 (Cooper) and Mono Lake (Brewer) northward to Oregon. This is perhaps the most strikingly 

 variable grass upon the coast, and would furnish several species were the characters constant. 

 At one extreme its stems, according to Mr. Bolander, are 12 feet high, and its roots do good ser- 

 vice in retaining the soil of the banks of streams. In these luxuriant forms the culm is as large 

 as the little finger, and the leaves, an inch or more broad, are over 2 feet long. The spike is 

 sometimes an inch and a half thick, dense and continuous, with erect appressed branches 2 inches 

 long, or it is much lobed or sometimes interrupted, with the branches in separate clusters. In 

 most of these large forms the florets are pale straw-color and menibranaceous, though in some 

 they are greenish and coriaceous, in which respect they approach the variety triticoides; indeed 

 no strict line can be drawn to separate them, and the variety is proposed for those forms that are 

 liable to be taken for some large Triticum. When it violates the character of the genus so far 

 as to have but one spikelet at a joint, there is nothing to distinguish the specimens from Trilicuiit,, 

 though none have been noticed in which there were not somewhere upon the spike two spikelets 

 to the joint. These triticoid forms sometimes branch, and Nuttall collected on Wapatoo Island a 

 subpaniculate form, with branches naked below. 



* * Glumes acuminate-pointed or awned : lower palet with an awn longer than 



itself. 



3. E. Sibiricus, Linn. Culms 2 to 3 feet high : leaves mostly ample, often 6 

 lines broad, and with the sheaths glabrous throughout or scabrous on the upper 

 surface : spike virgate, 2 to 8 inches long, often somewhat nodding above ; spikelets 



