Avena. | GRAMINE (Stapf). 479 
Widely cultivated in the temperate regions of both hemispheres. Probably of 
Mediterranean origin. 
The occurrence of the variety in the Cape Colony is doubtful. Nees’s note at 
the end of the paragraph on A. orientalis is rather in contradiction to the 
description given in the same place, and points to a confusion with some form of 
the typical A. sativa. 
2. A. sterilis (Linn. Spec. Pl. ed.ii. 118) ; culms usually fascicled 
with few or no barren shoots; sheaths glabrous, rarely the lower hairy ; 
ligules obtuse, 1-2 lin. long; blades linear to lanceolate-linear, up to 
1 ft. by 3-9 lin., glabrous, rarely scantily hairy, seabrid; panicle lax ; 
branches spreading equally all round or secund ; spikelets 15-20 lin. 
long, with 2-awned florets at the base and 1-2 (rarely 3) smaller 
white or whitish hairs up to the middle, 7-nerved, only the 2 lowest 
awned ; awn from the middle, scabrid to almost villous below, 
Suppl. 24, and in Mém, Acad. Pétersb. sér. 6, iv. 26; Reich. 
Fl Schinz, Consp. Fl. 
Sour Argica: without precise locality, Thunberg ! 
A weed of Mediterranean origin, 
: . fatua (Linn. Spec. Pl. 80); culms solitary or few in a tuft, 
with few or no barren shoots; leaf-sheaths glabrous or the lower 
more or less hairy; ligules short, very obtuse, up to 1} lin. long; 
~9-nerved ; valves lanceolate, acute, shortly 2—4-toothed, the lowest 
63-9 lin. long, usually brown below and green towards the tips, 
ane &xception of the very short callus, 7-nerved, all awned except the 
Tudimentary uppermost ; awn from the middle, scabrid, eolumn very 
] 
silky all over. Schreb. Beschreib. Gras. 109, t. 15; Host, Gram. 
Austr. ii. t. 58; Engl. Bot. t. 2221; Fl. Dan.t. 1629 ; Kunth, Enum. 
'- 3025 Trin. Gram. Suppl. 24; Nees in Linnea, vii, 306; Fl. A 
