FESTUCA. 



239 



vourite of sheep, abounding in all our hilly districts, and 

 producing a constant crop of sweet, short, nourishing 

 herbage. Its slender stems 

 and miimte panicles are 

 easily overlooked, and its 

 dark tufted foliage alone 

 attracts the eye ; the leaves 

 so narrow as to be almost 

 bristle-shaped. In the High- 

 lands this grass forms the 

 main sustenance of the sheep, 

 indeed Linnseus declares that 

 sheep have no relish for hills 

 where it is absent. We learn 

 from Gmelin that theTartars 

 had a great appreciation of 

 Sheep's Fescue, for they sought about among the hills 

 until they found a tract where it abounded, and then 

 fixed their tents there for the summer. As a meadow 

 grass Sinclair considers it inferior to the variety rubra, 

 excepting for its after-math, which cannot be excelled. 

 It is very useful as a lawn- grass. 



Throughout Britain it is common in healthy situations, 

 and also in Lapland, Norway, Sweden, Germany, France, 

 Switzerland, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Russia, Iceland, 

 Siberia, Greenland, and North America. 



F. ovina, var. vivipara, is not uncommon in alpine 

 situations ; we have seen it thus in Scotland, and in the 

 hilly districts of Yorkshire and Durham ; leaves grow 

 out of the glumes, and the panicle becomes a mass of 

 long ragged foliage. 



F. ovina, var. duriuscula. Tall Sheep's Fescue. — This 

 is accounted a distinct species by most authors. It has 



