PALMS 67 



acids, or dilute alcohol. According to Lescohier (Ibid., p. 273) 

 Sleepy Grass has some hypnotic properties but no anesthetic effects. 

 The drug will probably never assume any therapeutic importance, as 

 its marked depression on the vital functions of the body obviates 

 the possibility of utilizing its hypnotic properties. 



Allied Plants. Other species of Stipa are known to be poisonous 

 to cattle; among these the following may be mentioned: Stipa 

 inebrians, of Mongolia, is said to be poisonous to the stock of that 

 region and to produce effects exactly like those produced by the 

 sleepy grass of New Mexico. Stipa sibirica, of central and northern 

 Asia, is poisonous to stock, which die within a few hours after feeding 

 upon it unless remedial treatment is quickly given. Stipa lepto- 

 stachya and S. hystricina, of Bolivia and Argentina, are fatal to stock 

 of those countries. Heim and Herbert found that these plants con- 

 tain a glucoside that splits up and yields 0.02 per cent of hydrocyanic 

 acid, which probably is the real cause of the death of the stock that 

 have eaten the grass. Stipa capillata, of Europe and Asia; S. 

 spartea, the porcupine grass, and S. setigera, of North America, 

 may be fatal to stock in a purely mechanical manner. The hard 

 pointed, hairy callus of the seed may puncture the skin and work 

 its way inward until it strikes a vital organ, killing the animal. 



PALM.E, OR TRUE PALMS 



They are mostly shrubs and trees restricted to tropical and sub- 

 tropical countries. They were at one time quite extensively distrib- 

 uted and very numerous and at the present time they are represented 

 by about 1000 species. They are mostly unbranched shrubs and 

 trees and the trunks may reach the height of 35 M., and usually bear 

 at the summit a cluster of large leaves which are either pinnate 

 (feather palms) or palmate (fan palms). Some of the palms are low 

 growing, as the saw palmetto of the southern United States, which 

 has a creeping and branching root stock or rhizome. They are of 

 very great importance to man, being employed for a large number 

 of purposes. The anatomy of the stem is quite characteristic, con- 

 sisting of an epidermal layer with siliceous walls; the fibro vascular 

 bundles, consisting of 1 to 3 tracheae and numerous tracheids, are of 

 the concentric type and lie quite close to each other forming a rather 

 characteristic woody portion. The leaves usually possess on the 

 dorsal surface a hypodermal layer beneath which occur radially 

 elongated groups of sclerenchymatous fibers and between which is 

 distributed the chlorophyll-containing parenchyma, which resembles 



