578 



THE NATURE BOOK 



ing nature of this grass. Securely enve- 

 loped in the sheathing membrane, im- 

 mature blades of several lengths are 

 shown packed one upon the other. 

 They are glabrous in type, that is, non- 

 hairy, and purely green in colour. 



In contradistinction, the 

 Sheep's Fescue is glaucous, 

 having a grey bloom on 

 blades that are almost 

 cylindrical in form. It is 

 also a strongly tufting 

 grass, var3dng from an inch 

 or two to twenty-four ; 

 the flower stem is a four- 

 angled construction sup- 

 porting a purple panicle 

 of perhaps four inches in 

 length. The spikelets are 

 small, and the glumes 

 show little, if any, of the 

 hair-like awns. 



It is one of our common- 

 est grasses on the dry up- 

 lands, and, like the Mat 

 Grass, is perennial in root- 

 stock, flowering through 

 June and July. Compared 

 Nvith the finely attenuated 

 blades, the flowering head 

 is a strong construction 

 showing some breadth of 

 development . 



Kaieria cristata, the 

 Crested Hair Grass, 

 although a grass of short 

 growth associated with 

 high dry pastures, is far 

 less t3^pical than those 

 species already mentioned. 

 For the surface is downy, 

 although the flowering 

 glumes are membranous, green and white 

 in colouring, and have a silvery sheen 

 upon them. The shortened growth of 

 twelve inches proclaims the grass of drv 

 quarters, yet the stout stem and solid 

 nodes, together with the liroadened blade, 

 expresses relationship with the grass of 

 the valleys. The spike may x-ary from 

 one inch to four inches ; when meeting 

 the diminutive example we more easily 

 recognise the plant contracted by its 

 situation, and forming the distinct species. 



\ still stronger departure from the con- 

 tracted type of hill grass is the Mountain 



DOWNY OAT. 



Cats-tail {Phleum alpinum). It is an 

 admirable instance of Nature's apparent 

 extreme objection to be regulated, even 

 by principles of growth, according to 

 circumstance. Exactly when you have 

 made elaborate definitions and classifica- 

 tions concerning species, 

 and founded general rules 

 concerning them — as 

 taught by themselves, 

 moreover — just then an 

 individual, or a species, 

 \\'riggles from precise grasp 

 and escapes by the back 

 door, to be and grow as 

 it likes, and where it likes. 

 And our part is then to 

 observe these facts, and 

 reflect upon them, always 

 recollecting that Nature is 

 both extremely flexible and 

 extremely self-willed — for 

 i / m 'ill said and done, the 



I i m acceptance of modification 



' * ' is only the determination 



to persist turned inside 

 out. 



The Mountain Cats-tail, 

 living high up in the world, 

 in stature anything from 

 six inches to eighteen, is, 

 after all, our old friend 

 the Timothy Grass of the 

 meadows. 



Although botanically 

 classed as a separate spe- 

 cies, one must not forget 

 that this is an entirely 

 fictitious arrangement of 

 man's making, and in- 

 herently none of the 

 plant's own. For we see in 

 this mountain variety the same inflated 

 leaf-sheath and broad blade that possess 

 a certain resemblance to the Reed. In- 

 deed, the term Phleum, coming from 

 the Greek word plileos, a reed-like plant, 

 is very suggestive that apart from our 

 (n\'n shores this grass may be very much 

 more reed-like. 



There is little of the attenuated character 

 about it, although there is reduction in 

 actual height. Sometimes, this species 

 is the water-lo\'ing one, e\'en at a 

 high altitude, as it is found on the edges 

 of mountain springs. The purple spike, 



