﻿GRASSES OF SCOTLAND. 119 



mostly on rock and walls, and is a rare grass in Scotland, found oc- 

 casionally in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh and on the Fifeshire 

 coast In England it occurs in the counties of Durham, Worcester, 

 Glo'ster, Surrey, Kent, Hants, Somerset, and Devon ; also a native 

 of Germany, Switzerland, France, and Italy. It has not been found 

 in Ireland or America. Its limits of altitude seem to be about 500 

 feet above the sea. 



Flowers in the third week of June, and ripens its seed about the 

 end of July. 



78. Bromus erectus.* 

 Upright Brome- Grass. 



Specific Characters. — Large glume three-ribbed. Awn about half 

 the length of the palea. Outer palea indistinctly seven-ribbed, and 

 one- third longer than the small glume. (Plate LI.) 



Description. — It grows from two to three feet high. The root is 

 perennial, fibrous. Stem erect, round, smooth, and polished ; bear- 

 ing four or five leaves, with somewhat hairy sheaths, especially the 

 lower ones, (the hairs pointing upwards) ; the upper sheath crowned 

 with a short, obtuse, ragged ligule. Joints five, very slightly pubes- 

 cent Leaves narrow, linear, acute, harsh, scabrous towards the 

 points, nearly erect, with long slender scattered hairs pointing up- 

 wards. The upper leaf broader than those of the root Inflorescence 

 racemed or simple panicled. Raceme erect, rather close, its branches 

 and upper part of the rachis rough ; the lowermost branches arising 

 from the rachis mostly in threes. Spikelets erect, of eight or nine 

 awned florets, (sometimes with only four florets,) tinged with brown- 

 ish purple. Calyx of two nearly equal acute glumes (Fig.l), glos- 

 sy, membranous at the margins ; upper glume the larger, three-rib- 

 bed, the dorsal rib toothed its whole length ; lower glume without 

 lateral ribs, and toothed at the back. Florets of two paleae (Fig. 2), 

 the outer palea of lowermost floret about one-third longer than the 

 small glume of the calyx ; bifid and membranous at the summit ; 

 seven-ribbed, four of which are rather indistinct ; the dorsal rib mi- 

 nutely toothed its whole length, and terminating in a straight rough 

 awn about half the length of the palea, and passing behind the bifid 



* Bromus erectus, Koch, Smith, Hooker, LincIIey, 



