682 



CXII. GRAMINE^ 



[Melocalamus 



thick coriaceous, shorter than internodes, blade linear-lanceolate, recurved. 

 L. 9-12 by 1-2 in., pet. ^ in., n. 20-30 on | in. Fl. frequently, panicle large, 

 often leafy, branches fistulose, bearing half-whorls of long hairj' spikes, with 

 globose compact fl. heads J in. diam., like the beads of a rosary, |— 2 in. apart, 

 Spikelets small, | in. long and as broad, fertile fl. 2, lodicules large, ciliate r 

 ovary glabrous, style short, stigmas 2 or 3. Fr. 1-1 J- in. diam., the pericarp 

 fleshy while immature, ultimately coriaceous, the embryo has a large scntelluni 

 without endosperm. The seed often germinates while attached to the branch, 

 putting forth a shoot and tuft of roots before falling to the ground. 



Silhet, Cachar, Chittagong. Upper Burma : hills N.E. of Bhamo 6,000 ft. Ruby 

 Mines district 4,000 ft. Lower Burma : Arakan Toma, Thayetmyo district and hills 

 east of Toungoo 4-6,000 ft. A flowering on a large scale on the hills n. east of Bhamo 

 reported in Ind. For. xxviii. 432. In Yunnan sandals are made of the outer green 

 fibrous layers of the internodes. 



13. MELOCANNA, Trinius ; Fl. Brit. Ind. vii. 417. Dr. Otto Stapf, 

 On the fruit of Melocanna in Trans. Linn. Society, ser. 2, Botany, vol. vi. 

 401, 1904. 



Spikelets usually 2-5 on an arrested axis, so as to appear fascicled, in the 

 axils of large bracts, each spikelet with numerous empty glumes and one &., 

 rarely bisexual, usually $ with a rudimentary pistil or 5 with sterile 

 anthers. In the axils of the lower empty glumes, or rather bracts, are 

 frequently buds which develop into short branchlets with a spikelet at the 

 end. The fascicles of spikelets are on unilateral spikes, which are 1-6 in. 

 long and are arranged in long narrow pedunculate more or less unilateral 

 panicles. The peduncle of these panicles consists of several often elongated 

 internodes, at the nodes with sheathing bracts, rarely with well-developed 

 1. The panicles are of unequal length (the longest up to 3 ft.) and stand in 

 dense lateral fascicles at the nodes of the culm. Most of these panicles are 

 androdynamous, that is predominantly or exclusively male, while others, 

 chiefly the shorter panicles, are gynodynamous, that is, predominantly or 



exclusively female, bisexual 

 fl. occurring occasionally in 

 either. In some cases the 

 spikelet is 2-fld., and the 

 palea of the lower fl. has one 

 or two pairs of nerves. Fr. 

 large, pyriform, beaked, the 

 cells of the thick fleshy peri- 

 carp filled with starch. Seed 

 when ripe, without endo- 

 sperm, the embryo with a 

 large scutellum, which is 

 separated from the pericarp 

 by a thin layer of thin-walled 

 more or less crushed cells. 

 When the seed germinates 

 the embryo derives its first 

 nourishment from the starch 

 of the pericarp. (This descrip- 

 tion relates to M. bam- 

 busoides, fl. and fr. of the 

 other species not being 

 known.) 



1. M. bambusoides, 

 Trin. ; Kurz F. Fl. ii. 569, 

 Gamble t. 105. — Syn. Sam- 



Fig. 199. Melocanna bambusoides, Trin. ; the 



right-hand figure represents the germinating 



fruit, i. 



