286 Grammece. [Phragmites. 



J». Cornucopiae, Linn.f. Nov. Gram. 31 (1779). 



Trim. Cat. Ceyl. PI. 109. 



Fl. B. Ind. vii. 30. Roxb. PI. Corom. t. 131. 



Stolons several inches long, as thick as a crow-quill, stiff, 

 polished, rooting at the nodes ; stems 2-6 in., stout, internodes 

 much shorter than the sheaths; 1. 1-3 by fV~l in., truly linear, 

 erect or recurved, tip rounded, striate, coriaceous, veins ob- 

 scure, base complicate, margins smooth glabrous or ciliolate, 

 sheaths equitant, short, strongly compressed, margins hyaline, 

 mouth not auricled, ligule a pubescent ridge; spikes usually 

 half sunk in the uppermost spathiform l.-sheath, ped. 1-3 in. 

 long, rhachis narrow, dorsally compressed, margins smooth 

 or scaberulous; spikelets about \ in. long; glumes I and II 

 glistening, I linear or very narrowly lanceolate, acuminate, 

 II one-third longer, acuminate or aristulate, rhachilla half as 

 long as the glumes, which are firmly attached to it, silkily 

 villous, awn about twice as long as the glume, uppermost fig. 

 glumes with narrow lateral lobes, or reduced to a fig. or neuter 

 mid lobe; grain red-brown. 



Mannar district, between Vedatativu and Mantai (Trimen). Spikes 

 green. 



Also in Mysore and the Carnatic. 



One of the most curious of Indian grasses, of doubtful affinity. All 

 the glumes in the spikelet are sometimes neuter. The glumes are so 

 firmly attached to the rhachilla as to require force to remove them ; the 

 latter, disarticulating by its pointed base, carries away with it all the 

 glumes except the persistent I and II. 



64. PHRA6MITES, Trin. 



Tall, perennial, gregarious grasses, with creeping, stolo- 

 niferous rootstocks ; stems stout, hollow, leafy upwards ; 1. 

 long ; infl. a decompound panicle ; spikelets 2- or more-fid., 

 pedicelled, not articulate at the base, laterally compressed, 

 fan-shaped when expanded, rhachilla elongate between all 

 the glumes, disarticulating above glume III, and between the 

 fig. glumes, penicillate with very long silky hairs, articulate 

 at the base; glumes all membranous, very narrow, shining, 

 I and II empty, distant at the base, very unequal, oblong- 

 lanceolate, persistent, I 1 -veined, II 3-veined, III much 

 longer, narrowly linear-lanceolate, acute, 3-veined, male or 

 neuter, persistent, IV and following glumes bisexual or 

 uppermost imperfect, subulate-lanceolate, finely acuminate, 

 hyaline, 3-veined, disarticulating with the rhachilla, palea 

 much shorter than its glume, very narrow, 2-keeled ; lodi- 

 cules 2, obliquely cuneate ; stam. 1-3, anth. very large ; 



