No. 4. 

 , PANICUM LACHNANTHUM Torrey. 



Roots slender. 



Culms closely tufted, with numerous short sterile branches from near the base, 

 erect or ascending, 1 to 2% feet high, slender, glabrous. 



Leaves with flat blades 1 to 2 lines wide; sheaths from smooth to divaricately 

 villous, those of the lower part of the stem long and far exceeding the short inter- 

 nodes, those (sheaths) of the rootstock densely soft villous; ligule about !- lines 

 long, broadly obtuse, apical margin fimbriate; blade from glabrous to minutely 

 pubescent, commonly 2 to 4 inches long. 



Inflorescence a panicle on a long slender peduncle. Panicle contracted, 4 to 9 

 inches long, composed of 7 to 9 erect or appressed sessile branches 1 inch or more 

 long; spikelets closely racemose on the branches; pedicel flat; branches of the pani- 

 cle triangular, both with green scabrous angles. 



Spikelets narrowly to broadly lanceolate-acuminate, 1-J to 2 lines long, showing 

 an inclination toward an arrangement in 2 rows along the raceme. 



Glumes 4; 3 lower membranaceous, empty; first a minute, hyaline, obtuse scale 

 from line long to nearly obsolete; second narrowly lanceolate, acuminate, 3- to 

 5-nerved, densely long- villous on the back, hairs when the grain is mature, spread- 

 ing in all directions as if from a point in the center of the spikelet; third similar 

 to the last but broader and about 5-nerved, its middle portion glabrous, intra- 

 marginal hairs as in the second glume and similarly spreading; fourth (flowering) 

 glabrous, thin, coriaceous, with thin membranaceous margins, indistinctly 3-nerved, 

 minutely roughened in longitudinal lines, lanceolate, acuminate, when mature 

 chestnut-brown. 



Flower single, hermaphrodite. Palet similar in texture, shape, and color to the 

 flowering glume, nerveless. Stamens 3; anthers \ line long, one-half as broad. 

 Stigmas long, cylindrical. 



Grain inclosed by the palet and its glume, oval, obcompressed, white, slightly 

 exceeding f line long. 



PLATE IV; a, spikelet opened to show its parts, on the left the second glume 

 and flowering glume, on the right the third glume and palet. The first glume, 

 which should stand on the right, is omitted; the inflexed membranaceous margins 

 of the flowering glume and palet are not shown; and the ovary is represented as 

 of the size of a mature grain with the anthers twice their real length. 



This grass grows freely on stony hills, and probably is capable of resisting 

 drought. It seems deserving of trial as an agricultural grass for the southwest. 



