ARUND0. 



297 



similar districts of the Highlands of Scotland. It is a 

 peculiar-looking plant, stiff in its manner of growth, and 

 more like a rush than a 

 simple grass. It flourishes 

 well in the Botanic Gar- 

 dens at Edinburgh, flowering 

 freely in April and May. 



Its foreign homes are 

 Iceland, Sweden, Germany, 

 France, and Italy. 



Sir J. E. Smith gives an 

 interesting account of the 

 generic name of this plant. 

 It was given, he says, by 

 Professor Scopoli, who states 

 in the first edition of his 

 ' Flora Carniolica/ that, " He never could forget the 

 delightful garden, so rich in rare plants, which he used 

 to visit while at Venice in 1745. It was formed in the 

 island of St. Helen, by Dr. Leonard Sesler, whose great 

 diligence in observing and cultivating plants justly enti- 

 tled him, in Scopoli's opinion, to this botanical comme- 

 moration." 



Genus XLII. ARUNDO. HEED. 



Gen. Char. Inflorescence panicled; spikelets several- 

 flowered ; outer glumes unequal, oblong, pointed ; flowering 

 glumes as long as the outer ones ; palea the same length ; 

 from the base of the florets arise a number of long hairs. 



Arundo Phragmites, Linn. Common Reed. 



Eoot perennial, creeping; stems annual, erect, simple, 

 six feet high, leafy ; joints fifteen, smooth ; leaves lanceolate, 



