HITCHCOCK AND CHASE NORTH AMERICAN PANICUM. 13 



PANICULATA. 



11. P. dichotomum. 



12. P. clandestinum. 



13. P. capillar e. 



14. P. patens. 



15. P. dactylon =Capriola dactylon (L.) Kimtze. 



16. P. miliaceum. 



17. P. latifolium. 



18. P. brevifolium. 



19. P.arborescens a =P. brevifolium L. 



20. P. virgatum. 



THE TYPE OF PANICUM. 



As stated above, the historic type species of Panicum is ChaetocJdoa 

 italica, the common foxtail millet. This is the plant to which the 

 name Panicum was universally applied by Latin writers as far back 

 as our record extends. As the idea of genera developed, botanists, 

 until the time of Tournefort, included under the general name Pan- 

 icum other species with a similar inflorescence. This author included 

 several rather diverse species, but the one which he chose for his 

 illustration and which we may consider his type was the same well- 

 known plant, the Panicum of the ancients (ChaetocMoa italica). 



Another ancient name, Milium, was applied to a widely cultivated 

 cereal (Panicum miliaceum), and later, as the idea of genera grew, the 

 name was made to include the sorghums, and was thus used by 

 Tournefort, 6 who. however, figured P. miliaceum as his type species. 



Linnaeus at first accepted these two genera in the historic sense, 

 and the type of his Panicum, since he referred to Scheuchzer, was the 

 plant now called ChaetocMoa viridis. Later, however, his ideas under- 

 went a change, until finally in 1753 he had united under the generic 

 name Panicum the twenty species mentioned above, including, as 

 will be seen, not only the historic type of Panicum and its allies, and 

 another common species (Echinochloa crusgalli) referred to Panicum 

 by Tournefort b and other pre-Linnaean botanists, but also several 

 new species, and, most noteworthy of all, Panicum miliaceum, the 

 type of the old genus Milium. He, however, still retained the name 

 Milium for another genus (including M. effusum and M. confertum). 

 Since no generic descriptions are given in the Species Plantarum, it is 

 necessary to consult the first succeeding edition of the Genera Plan- 

 tarum, namely the fifth, published in 1754. In this place Linnaeus 

 still credits the genus Milium to "Tournef. 298," though he has 



aTrimen (Journ. Linn. Soc. Bot. 24: 155. 1888.) states that this species, as de- 

 scribed in Linnseus's Flora Zeylanica, upon which is based P. arborescens L., is P. 

 ovalifolium Poir. (P. brevifolium L.), and that the specimen in the Linnaean Herba- 

 rium belongs to the same species. Mixed with the above-mentioned herbarium speci- 

 men is a fragment of an Arundinaria, which probably accounts for the specific name 

 and the reference to its lofty stature. 



&Inst. Rei Herb. 54. pi. 298. f. L. 1700. 



