/ 



OEAMINE^. 589 



with long, capillary brandies, usually in threes, often occupying half the 

 whole height of the plant. Spikelets and glumes as in the early A. 



In sandy and hilly pastures, with the same area as the early A., and fully 

 as common in Britain. Fl. summer, rather early. 



XVIII. OAT. AVENA. 



Spikelets several-flowered (usually with 3 to 5 flowers, rarely more, or 2 

 only), in a loose panicle. Glumes scarious, at least at tlietop; the outer 

 empty ones lanceolate and tapering to a point ; the flowering ones smaller, 

 2-cleft at the top, each lobe tapering into a point, with a long, twisted, and 

 bent awn on the back of the glume. The terminal glume of the spikelet 

 often small and empty or rudimentary. Axis of the spikelet hairy under 

 the flowering glumes. 



A considerable genus, widely spread over the temperate and colder regions 

 of both hemispheres, or in the higher mountains within the tropics. 



Annual. Spikelets hanging, 8 to 10 lines long 1. Wild O. 



Perennial. Spikelets erect or spreading. 



Spikelets about 6 liaes long 2. Ferennial 0. 



Spikelets about 3 lines long 3. Yellow O. 



1. Wild Oat. A,vena fatua, Linn. 

 (Eng. Bot. t. 2221.) 



An erect, glabrous annual, 2 to 3 feet high, with a loose panicle of large 

 spikelets, hanging from filiform pedicels of unequal length, arranged in alter- 

 nate bunches along the main axis. Outer glumes near J inch long, pale- 

 green or purplish, tapering to a thin, scarious point. Flowering glumes 2 

 or 3, scarcely so long, of a firm texture at the base, and covered outside with 

 long, brown hairs, tliin and cleft at the top, each lobe tapering into a short 

 point. Awn full twice as long as the spikelet, twisted at the base, abruptly 

 beut about the middle. 



A common weed of cultivation in all corn countries, and generally con- 

 fined to cornfields, so that its origin is as yet doubtful, but probably a na- 

 tive of tlie east Mediterranean region. Abundant in Britain. Fl. with the 

 corn. A variety with the flowering glumes larger and more like the outer 

 ones, hairy only below the middle, and terminating in 2 almost awn-like 

 points, has been distmguished under the name of A. strigosa (Eng. Bot. t. 

 1266), and it has been lately shown that the cultivated Oat is but a variety 

 of the same species, readUy degenerating into the wild form. 



2. Ferennial Oat. Avena prateusis, Linn. 

 (Eng. Bot. t. 1204.) 

 An erect perennial, with a tufted or shortly creeping rootstock, 1 to 1^^ 

 feet high with narrow leaves in dry pastures, but in rich mountain meadows 

 attaining often 3 feet high, the leaves then broader, with much flattened 

 sheaths. Panicle either slightly compound or reduced to a simple raceme. 

 Spikelets erect, usually 3- or 4-flowered, glabrous and shining. G-lumes all 

 scarious at the top ; the outermost empty one about 6 lines long, tapering to 

 a point ; the next similar but rather longer ; the flowering ones gradually 

 smaller, shortly cleft at the point, with an awn on the back fuU twice their 

 length. 



3 B 



