poa. 273 



Dr. Parnell found it near Edinburgh. He men- 

 tions a variety of his Pohjnoda with the middle rib of 

 the flowering glume toothed its whole length, and having 

 a single hair at the base of the floret. Mr. Lyle ga- 

 thered this grass at Airth, near Stirling. 



The normal form of P. com.pressa grows about a foot 

 high, and frequents wall-tops and dry banks throughout 

 Great Britain and Ireland, excepting the north of Scot- 

 land. 



Its foreign homes are throughout Europe and in 

 North America. It begins to flower in June, and pro- 

 duces a succession of panicles until August. Mr. Sole 

 considers it a good grass for parks and sheep pastures, 

 as it causes the mutton to cut short and be fine-flavoured, 

 where it grows ; the sheep take care that not a panicle of 

 it ever lives to flower. 



The webbing of P. compressa and its varieties seems 

 most capricious. 



10. Poa pratensis^ Linn. Meadow Poa. 



(Also P. mbccdrulea, EDg. Bot.) 



Root perennial, creeping ; stems smooth, one to two feet 

 high, erect ; leaves linear, flat, pointed, rather narrow, rather 

 rough on the edges and the inner surface, sheaths somewhat 

 inflated, smooth; ligule short, blunt; panicle spreading, 

 generally tinted with purple, two to three inches long, 

 sometimes drooping ; branches roughish, slender, spreading, 

 placed in clusters of three or five ; spikelets four-flowered, 

 ovate, slightly flattened, numerous, nearly all stalked ; outer 

 glumes lanceolate, three-ribbed, connected by a web, nearly 

 equal; flowering glumes five-ribbed, keels covered with 

 delicate silky hair, side-ribs very faint; palea short, the 

 summit cut into two teeth. 



T 



