166 EATONIA. 



30- EATONIA Kaf. REBOULEA, KUJS T TH. 



GENERIC CHARACTER. 



Spikelets usually 2-flowered, and with an abortive 

 rudiment or pedicel, numerous, in contracted or 

 slender panicle, very smooth. Glumes somewhat 

 equal in length, but very dissimilar, a little shorter 

 than the flowers ; the lower narrowly linear, keeled, 

 1-nerved ; the upper broadly obovate, folded round 

 the flowers, 3-nerved on the back, not keeled, scari- 

 ous-margined. Lower palet oblong, obtuse, com- 

 pressed, boat-shaped, naked, charataceous ; the 

 upper very thin and hyaline. Stamens 3. Grain lin- 

 ear-oblong, not grooved. Perennial, slender grasses, 

 with simple and tufted culms, and often sparsely 

 downy sheaths, flat flower leaves, and small greenish 

 (or rarely purplish) tinged spikelets. 



Named for Professor Amos Eaton, author of a 

 popular manual of the botany of the United States, 

 which was for a long time the only general work 

 available for students in this country, and of other 

 popular treatises. 



Gray. 



1. E, Obtusata, Gray. Dry soil, Pennsylvania to 

 Wisconsin, and southward. Flowers in June and 

 July. 



2. E. Pennsylvania (Pennsylvania Eatonia). Is a 

 common grass in moist woods anrl meadows through- 

 out the Northern States. Flowers in June and 

 July. 



