THE VICTORIAN NATURALIST. 159 



broad, loose, pubescent with the short shining hairs. Upper 

 leaves rather short ; upper sheaths and leaves scabrous and 

 puberulent. Ligule ciliate. Panicle of a greyish or pale colour, 

 first erect, then spreading, from about 6 to 12 inches long. 

 Branches capillary, beset with very short hairs. Spikelets short, 

 usually of a purplish or somewhat green colour, otherwise pale or 

 Hght brown, on short or long capillary pedicels. Empty glumes 

 unequal, thin, veins vanishing in the hyaline portion. Outer 

 glume about 4 Unes long, more or less truncate and toothed, 

 frequently with three short teeth, the middle tooth the shortest, 

 the tooth in the lower margin of the glume the broadest and 

 longest. Inner glume about 3 lines long, truncate, with two 

 or three usually unequal teeth. Flowering glume about 2^ lines 

 long, on a hairy stipes, beset with short, whitish, shining hairs ; 

 the stipes nearly a line long ; lobes, none. Awn from less than 

 2 to 2^ inches long, in young plants nearly straight, in older 

 tortuous below, twisted above, shortly and softly hairy to the 

 twist, the hairs appressed, rather spreading or almost plumose, 

 rarely with an additional line of hairs above the twist. Palea 

 about i^ lines long, shining, oblong-linear, with narrow hyaline 

 margins, and two thin but well-defined whitish veins, vanishing 

 in the hyaline summit, hairy at the back. Grain narrow, nearly 

 2 lines long. 



Flowers October to December. Sandy desert, Lowan, 1898 ; 

 F. M. Reader. 



The species is named in honour of Mr. J. G. Luehmann, curator 

 of that magnificent collection of plants — the National Herbarium. 



This species belongs to the section of the genus Stipa with the 

 flowering glume silky-hairy, the margins not dilated under the 

 awn, the ligule ciliate. It is distinguished from S. semibarbata 

 by the glumes being much smaller and toothed, &c. ; from 

 S. hemipogon by the toothed unequal and shorter glumes, &c. ; 

 from aS'. pubescens it differs chiefly in the teeth of the glumes, in 

 the smaller size of them, &c. ; from ^S*. aristiglumis, also, this 

 species is distinguished by teeth and smaller glumes, &c. It is 

 separated from S. eriopus, triolwphylla, and scabra by its 

 truncated and toothed glumes. 



This new grass may easily be discerned from other species by 

 the soft vestiture of the leaves and sheaths, which give the plant 

 a greyish appearance. S. semibarbata, var. mollis, in this respect, 

 however, resembles S. luehmanrdi, but the former is a stouter 

 plant with much denser panicle and larger glumes, and in the 

 latter the panicle of plants in a more advanced state with its 

 twisted awns is much more like S. scabra. In habit this species 

 is not unlike the variety elatior of S. scabra, but the greyish hairs 

 gives S. luehmannii quite a different aspect, and is also a stouter 

 plant. 



