Leptochloa.] Graminece. 283 



linear, acuminate, flat or complicate, coriaceous, smooth on 

 both surfaces and margins, sheaths smooth, keeled, mouth 

 not auricled, ligule short, membranous, lacerate ; panicle 

 6-10 in., contracted, rhachis filiform, smooth; spikes \-\\ in., 

 very slender, internodes of rhachis short, appearing pectinate 

 from the spreading glumes of the imbricating spikelets ; 

 spikelets i-fld., 26 ~ i& i n -> subsessile; glumes I and II oblong, 

 acute, keels scabrid, fig. glume as long as II, ovate, acute, 

 hyaline, nearly orbicular when spread out, base bearded, 

 lateral veins marginal, and keels of oblong palea ciliate with 

 long flexuous hairs ; anth. small ; grain oblong, concavo- 

 convex, rugulose, red-brown, pericarp closely adnate to the 

 seed. 



Hot parts of the Island, Trincomalie and Batul Oya (Glenie), Dam- 

 bulla (Thwaites), Tissa-maha-rama Tank (Trimen). Spikelets red-brown. 



The Carnatic, Australia. 



3. Xi. filiformis, Beauv. Agrost. 71 (181 2). 

 Thw. Enum. 371. C. P. 3245. 



Fl. B. Ind. vii. 298. Jacq. Eclog. Gram. t. iv. (Eleusine). Duthie, 

 Fodd. Grass. N. Ind. t. 71 {Eragrostis chinensis). 



Stems many, 1-2 ft, very slender, geniculately ascending 

 from the capillary root-fibres, leafy; 1. 4-6 by \-\ in., narrowed 

 from the middle to the finely acuminate tip and to the rounded 

 base, flat, thin, flaccid, scaberulous on both surfaces and on 

 the margins, midrib and veins very slender, sheaths smooth, 

 mouth shortly auricled, ligule a hyaline membrane fringed 

 with long hairs; panicle 4-6 in., rhachis filiform, flexuous, 

 smooth; spikes many, l|~2j in., capillary; spikelets loosely 

 imbricate, ^V~1t in. long, 2-3-fld., subsessile or shortly pedi- 

 celled, rhachilla produced between the flg. glumes, very 

 slender; glumes I and II shorter than the fig., oblong, mucro- 

 nate, keels scaberulous, flg. glumes oval, mucronulate at the 

 obscurely truncate tip, veins naked or ciliate, lateral rather 

 far from the margins, palea oblong, obtuse, keels ciliate; anth. 

 minute; grain broadly oblong, dorsally compressed and 

 obscurely keeled, rugulose, red-brown. 



Colombo, formerly in the garden of the Govt, offices, but has dis- 

 appeared (Ferguson). Spikelets green. 



Tropical Asia, Africa, and America. 



A plant so common in India as to suggest its having been overlooked 

 in Ceylon. 



4. Xi. chinensis, Nees in Syll. Ratisb. i. 4 (1824). 

 Thw. Enum. 371. Moon, Cat. 8. C. P. 3748. 



Fl. B. Ind. vii. 299. Duthie, Fodd. Grass. N. Ind. t. 71. 



Stem 2-4 ft., erect or gec'culately ascending from a short 

 creeping rootstock, with .tout root-fibres, stout or slender, 



