Jan 15, 1928.] Revision of the Flora of the Bombay Presidency 434 



long as the sessile spikelets, tips with a lanceolate tooth or 3-toothed, margins 

 loag-villous, 3 5-5 mm. long. Lower involucral glume (above the lowest spike- 

 let) with lanceolate centre becoming oblanceolate or oblong from the keels 

 being membranously winged above the middle, back with a vertical median 

 depression below the middle corresponding to a ridge inside ; upper cymbiform 

 with the dorsal keel winged above, minutely ciliate below. 



Locality : Gujarat : Cbampanir (Chibber!) ; Ahmedabad, dry hills (Sedg- 

 wick 310 !) • Junagad, Kathiawar (Blatter 3783 !) ; Bhuj-Rhodir-Maha, Cutch 

 (Blatter 3649 !) ; An jar, Cutch (Blatter 3741 !) .— Khandesh : Road to Chinchpada 

 (Chibber!); Toranmal (McCann A235 !). -Konkan : Wada Range (Ryan 

 488!) ; Gokhirva, Bassein (Ryan 41 !) ; Keltan (Ryan 392 !) ; St. Xavier's 

 College compound (McCann 4461 !). — Deccan : Ganeshkhind Botanic Gardens 

 (Garade 435 !) ; Purandhar (Bhide !) ; Pashan (Gammie !) ; Modasa (Sedgwick 

 and Saxton !) ; Khandala, very common (McCann !) ; Igatpuri (Blatter and 

 Hallberg-4432 !) ; Purandhar (McCann 5010 !) ; Kasara, Igatpuri Ghat (McCann 

 4343A !) ; Panchgani (Blatter and Hallberg B1248 !, B1282 !, B1297 !, B1324 !). 

 —5. M. Country : Haveri (Talbot 2180 !) ; Dharwar (Talbot 2616 !) ; Badami 

 (Talbot 2928 !). [According to Malcolmson, ' the Rusa grass in the Deccan 

 affects particularly the trap, more or less avoiding the granite, so much so that 

 he was able to trace the green-stone dykes across the granite by the luxuriance 

 of the grass ' (ex Stapf)]. 



Distribution ; From the Afghan frontier to the Rajmahal Hills in Bengal and 

 from the subtropical zone of the Himalaya to about 12° N., excluding the desert 

 region of the Punjab and the greater part of the northern Carnatic. 



Stapf excludes also the outer slopes of the Western Ghats, but the localities 

 given above show that the grass is well represented in that region. For the 

 history and uses of the Rusa grass oil Oleum Palmarosce seu Geranii Indici 

 (Palmarosa oil) see Stapf in Xew Bull. (1906), 338-341, 360. 



5. Cymbopogon caesius, Stapf in Kew Bull. (1906), 360. in Prain Fl. Trop. 

 Afr. ix, 287. — AndroPogon caserns, Nees in Wight. Cat. (1833) nos. 1700b {nomen 

 tantum) and in Hook, and Arn. Bot. Beech. Voy. 244 cum descriptione 

 (Partim). — A. Schcenanthus, var. caesius, Hack, in Monogr. Androp. 610; 

 Schweinf . in Bull Herb. Boiss. ii, App. ii, 14 ; Hook. f. in F.B.I. 205, exlus. 

 fere omnibus synon. 



For foundation of this species see Stapf in Kew Bull. (1906), 344. 



Description : A perennial, tufted grass, up to 1 m. high, with intra— and ex- 

 travaginal innovation-shoots from a short rhizome. Culms erect or geniculate- 

 ascending, slender, more or less wiry, frequently branched below, the branches 

 often in fascicles from the knees, often many-noded, terete, glabrous, smooth. 

 Leaf-blades linear from a scarcely narrowed rarely slightly rounded base, 

 tapering to a long setaceous point, those of the culms up to over 15 (sometimes 

 almost 30) cm. long, 2-6 (sometimes 10) mm. broad, of the innovations usually 

 much shorter, flat, bluish-glaucous, glabrous, smooth, midrib slender, primary 

 lateral nerves very fine, 3-4 on each side. Ligules very short, rounded, 

 scarious. Sheaths rather firm, tight, the lowest mostly short, those placed at 

 branching nodes at length thrown aside, inrolling or deciduous, glabrous, 

 smooth, usually much shorter than the internodes. Spathaceous panicle 

 narrow, mostly 7-15 cm. long, rarely much longer, sometimes reduced and 

 small, dense or interrupted ; internodes usually 4-6, the lowest rarely exceeding 

 a third of the panicle, the following gradually decreasing ; lowest primary 

 branch shortly exserted from its sheath, undivided at the base, or like the 

 following forming mixed or (upwards) simple-rayed tiers ; rays of ultimate 

 tiers 5-3, finely filiform. 7-10 cm. long, glabrous ; lowest subtending sheaths 

 with foliaceous blades: spathes lanceolate, acuminate— 2*5— 4 cm. long, sub- 

 herbaceous, glaucous, sometimes turning reddish. Spatheoles narrowly lanceo- 

 late, acuminate, 14-16 mm. long, subherbaceous to scarious, turning dirty 

 straw-colour or slightly reddish ; peduncles filiform 5 6 mm. long, glabrous. 

 Racemes 2 nate, obliqualy erect. 12-14 mm. long, greenish, more or less 

 white- villous, one subsessile, the other with a bare base, over 2 mm. long, finely 

 pubescent on the inner side, ciliate and thickened upwards, base of the sub- 

 sessile raceme swollen, hard, fused with the equally swollen and hard adjacent 

 pedicel ; fertile joints filiform, about 2 mm. long, glabrous on the back, densely 

 ciliate on the sides, cilia snow-white, tips often cupular with a crenulate margin 

 or auricle ; adjacent pedicels very similar. Homogamous pair 1 at the base of 



[27] 



