147 



Botanical description (B. Fl., vii, 606). 



Leaves very nearly those of T. pungens but longer, nearly terete, pungent-pointed, 



with viscid sheaths. 

 Panicle very much looser, 3 to 4 inches long, with capillary branches more or less 



spreading; the lower ones 1 to 1J inches long, with three or four pedicellate 



spikelets ; the upper ones short with one or two spikelets. 

 Spikelets dark-coloured, \ inch long when fully out, ovate or oblong, with eight to 



twelve flowers. 



Outer glumes three-nerved, obtuse or minutely three-toothed, about 3 lines long. 

 Flowering glumes 2^ lines long, three-nerved, the entire part densely silky- villous 



and at length somewhat hardened, the three acute rigid glabrous lobes as long 



as the entire part or the central one rather longer. 

 Palea glabrous. 



Value as a fodder. A wiry, uninviting grass, utterly valueless for 

 stock-feed except when quite young. 



Habitat and range. Found in all the Colonies except Tasmania and 

 Victoria. An interior species. 





 4. Triodia irritans, R.Br. 



Botanical name. Irritans, Latin, provoking, which this harsh, 

 prickly grass frequently is to travellers. 



Botanical description^. FL, vii, 607). A rigid, scrubby, glabrous 

 grass with long rigid convolute pungent-pointed leaves, not viscid in 

 any of the specimens seen. 



Panicle narrow, almost spike-like, 3 to 6 inches long. 



Spikelets solitary or few together, on short erecb capillary pedicels or branches, 



mostly three- or four-flowered, 4 to 5 lines long. 

 Oitter glumes glabrous, acute, five-nerved, 3 lines long. 



Flowering glumes not quite so long, villous with silky hairs at the base but much less 

 so than in T. pungens, truncate at the end, with three sets of three nerves, each 

 leading to three very short obtuse or truncate lobes or teeth, the lateral ones 

 rather broad, the central one smaller or minute. 

 Palca narrow. 



Value as a fodder. Of no value. 



Habitat and range. Found in all the colonies except Tasmania. 

 Only found in the arid interior. 



The occurrence of a resin in a Triodia, or in fact in any grass, is a 

 very interesting circumstance, and I attach copies of two papers by 

 myself on the subject. The matter is worthy of further inquiry. 

 " Last year (1888) Sir William Macleay was kind enough to give me 

 ff a sample- of gum used by the blacks for cementing the heads of 

 spears,* and prepared from Spinifex roots," which had been collected 

 by Mr. Walter Froggatt in the Napier Range (locally called Barrier 

 Eange), 100 miles inland from Derby, North-west Australia. 



I was dubious as to it being the product of a " Spinifex/' never 

 having heard of a grass yielding a resin, but Mr. Froggatt is emphatic 

 that he is not mistaken, nor is so experienced a collector likely to be. 

 The Spinifex is probably Triodia irritans, -~R.T$r., but further infor- 

 mation on the subject, giving the mode of preparation of the resin 



* ' ' The heads of spears from Western Australia in my collection are coated with a 

 hard gum, forming a ridge on one side, in which pieces of glass are impacted." Brough 

 Smyth's Aborigines of Victoria, <c., i, 336. Mr. Froggatt informs me that Spinifex resin 

 is put to such a purpose in the locality from which he obtained it. 



