50 



CONTKIBUTIONS FEOM THE NATIONAL HEKBARIUM. 



n. 301)." The type is in the herbarium of Drake de Castillo. The name was earliei 

 mentioned by Hemsley.a 



Panicum proliferum chloroticum Hack, in Repert. Nov. Sp. Fedde 7 : 343. 1909. 

 Based on P. chloroticum Nees. 



This species was referred by Pursh,& as it has been by most later authors, to P. 

 proliferum Lam. The latter is, however, the same as P. miliare Lam., an Old World 

 species. 



DESCRIPTION. 



Fig. 31. — P. dichotomifiorum. 

 From specimen of P. genicu- 

 latum Muhl. in Elliott Her- 

 barium. 



Plants usually freely branching, ascending or spreading from a geniculate base, oi 

 sometimes erect, usually smooth throughout, or, in tropical forms, more or less pubes- 

 cent; culms somewhat compressed, often thick and succulent, drying furrowed, 

 usually 50 to 100 cm. long, in robust specimens as much as 2 meters long, the nodes 

 smooth, at least the lower swollen; sheaths often com- 

 pressed, usually longer than the internodes, ciliate on the 

 margin toward the summit; ligules 1 to 2 mm. long; blades 

 flat or in small specimens sometimes folded, glabrous or 

 sparsely pilose above, 10 to 50 cm. long, 3 to 20 mm. wide, 

 at base about as wide as sheath, the white midnerve usu- 

 ally prominent; panicles terminal and axillary, included 

 at base or tardily short-exserted, many-flowered, 10 to 40 

 cm. long or more, the main branches ascending, or finally 

 spreading or even reflexed, the short branchlets appressed, 

 bearing short-pediceled, often rather crowded spikelets, 

 the axes angled and scabrous; spikelets narrowly oblong- 

 ovate, 2 to 3.2 mm., usually about 2.5 mm. long, about 0.9 

 mm. wide, acute, often greenish purple; first glume one- 

 fifth to one-fourth the length of the spikelet, truncate or broadly triangular; second 

 glume and sterile lemma more or less pointed beyond the fruit, rather faintly 7-nerved, 

 the palea of the sterile floret present or wanting; fruit 1.8 to 2 mm. long, about 0.8 mm. 

 wide, elliptic. 



This species as it occurs in the United States is usually glabrous throughout but 

 varies much in the size of the blades and of the spikelets, the latter varying from 2 to 

 3.2 mm. in length. Not uncommonly specimens occur with the upper surface of 

 some or all of the blades sparsely or even densely pilose, such as: Connecticut, 

 Wilson 1248; New York, Young in 1872; Pennsylvania, Heller in 1900; Delaware, 

 Commons 230; Kansas, Car leton in 1892 ; Florida, Chase 4294, Combs 94, 1251. One 

 series of specimens from Florida, Nash 567, c is low, 20 to 30 cm. high, with narrow 

 blades pubescent above, and papillose-hispid sheaths. Nash's no. 372 from the same 

 locality is glabrous throughout, except the ciliate margin of the sheaths, but otherwise 

 is the same as his no. 567. Two Cuban specimens, Hitchcock 149 and Wright 3860, are 

 like Nash's no. 567. Many of the West Indian specimens have blades pilose above, 

 some of which have spikelets about 2 mm. long and others about 3 mm. long. Such 

 are: Brace 3742, Britton & Cowell 432, Curtiss 177, Duss 3178, Eggers 4405, 4512, Geogr. 

 Soc. Baltimore 489, Hitchcock 150, Wright 3861. The South American specimens cited 

 are glabrous. Those from Arechavaleta and Morong 543 have small spikelets as in the 



Mexican Gramineae' is not yet published; but being already printed off and M. 

 Fournier having obligingly supplied me with a copy, I feel bound in so far as I am con- 

 cerned, to treat it as having already taken date." The Kew copy ends with page 150 

 and lacks index, title-page, and plates. 



a Biol. Centr. Amer. Bot. 3 : 489. 1885. 



&F1. Amer. Sept. 1:68. 1814. 



« This number was distributed under an unpublished varietal name, 



