102 



colonies, and is a cosmopolitan grass in addition. In New Sonth 

 Wales it is fonnd in most parts of the Colony. The following note 

 from a correspondent from Myall Plains, near Jerilderie, explains one 

 of its habitats : — 



" Only growing on some land that was cleared and burnt off last 

 January, and only in the stump holes and ashes where the trees were 

 burnt, and as thick as it can grow. It is quite unusual for grass to 

 grow here for several years where large trees or heaps of wood or 

 scrub are burnt, but this grass seems to come up at once, and do well 

 where the most ashes are found. It grows so high and rank that you 

 can trace where every portion of the tree has been burnt." 



47. HIEROCHLOE. 



Spikelets with one terminal hermaphrodite flower and two male 

 flowers below it, in a pyramidal or narrow terminal panicle, the rhachis 

 articulate above the two outer glumes. 



Glumes six, thinly scarious ; two outer acute, keeled, with a more or 

 less distinct short nerve on each side ; third and fourth obtuse or emar- 

 ginate, the keel sometimes produced into a short awn, each enclosing 

 a narrow palea and three stamens; fifth shorter, broad, obtuse, five- 

 nerved, the keel rarely produced into a short point, enveloping the 

 sixth which is narrower with a central nerve or keel.- 



No two-nerved palea to the terminal flower. 



Stamens two. 



Styles distinct. 



Grain enclosed in the two upper glumes. 



Spikelets crowded on the branches of the panicle ; outer glumes 



as long as the male ones ... ... ... ... ... ... 1. H. redolens. 



Spikelets all on slender pedicels ; outer glumes shorter than the 



male ones 2. H. rariflora. 



1. — Hierochloe redolens, R.Br. 



Botanical name. — Hierochloe or Hierochloa, from two Greek words — 

 Jiieros, holy; chloe, grass. It is generally and properly spelt Hierochloa, 

 but Gmelin, author of the genus, spelt it Hierochloe ; redolens — Latin, 

 smelling sweet. 



Vernacular name. — " Sweet-scented Grass." 



Where figured. — Labillardiere, as Disarrenum antarcticum ; 

 Buchanan. 



Botanical description (B. Fl., vii, 558). — Stems tufted, erect, branch- 

 ing, leafy, 2 to 3 feet high. 



Jjeaves flat, rather rigid, slightly scabrous, otherwise glabrous, the ligula scarious, 



entire. 

 Panicle rather dense, secund or nodding, 4 to 10 inches long in the larger forms, the 



spikelets crowded along the primary branches, forming spike-like secondary 



panicles of 1 to 1| inches, the upper ones sessile, the lower distant on clustered 



filiform peduncles. 



