284 BRITISH GRASSES. 



Prussia, Greenland, Iceland, North America, and the 

 United States. 



The nutritive properties of this grass are considerable, 

 but until recently its diminutive size was considered a suf- 

 ficient objection to its cultivation. About a dozen years 

 ago Mr. Archibald Gorrie having heard the Highland 

 shepherds extol the merits of their " broad-leaved hill- 

 grass," he procured plants and set about giving it a fair 

 trial. He planted it at Annat, about 170 feet above 

 sea-level, and it produced its panicles early in May, 

 opening its flowers at the end of the month, and ripen- 

 ing a rich profusion of seeds at the end of June. Its 

 roots are strictly fibrous, and the broad, tufted foliage, 

 which is very abundant, averages about six inches in 

 length; its stems attain to fully afoot in height, and 

 are terminated by the densely-formed seed panicles. 

 As a pasture grass he particularly recommends it to the 

 attention of upland stock farmers, as it may be intro- 

 duced into hill pastures by transplantation, where, if 

 not too closely eaten down, it will ripen abundance of 

 seed, and quickly establish itself. Or he suggests it 

 being sown in quantities of from five pounds to ten pounds 

 per acre, on moorlands, early in spring, after the heath has 

 been burned, and tramped in by driving sheep repeatedly 

 over the ground. 



15. Poa bulbosa, Linn. Bulbous Poa. 



Eoot perennial, bulbous ; stems bulbous at the base, 

 cylindrical, smooth, from five to nine inches high; joints 

 three; leaves flat, acute, roughish on the inner surface, 

 finely serrated at the edges, short, smooth behind; sheaths 

 smooth, striated, those at the root swollen, the uppermost 



