GRAMlNEiE 



431 



GEAMINE^ 1 



Wind flowers. Generally protandrous. Stem round 

 or compressed, generally hollow. The flower, or floret, 

 of grasses is enclosed in two bracts or glumes, one 

 slightly above the other ; it consists of two " glumelles," 

 the lower one of which is often termed the flowering 

 glume, the upper the pale. 

 Above these two leaves are two 

 very minute scales known as 

 lodicules or glumellules, followed 

 by the stamens and pistil. The 

 lodicules swell and separate the 

 pale and glume, thus enabling 

 the stamens and stigmas to 

 protrude. Theoretically the 

 flower may be regarded as con- 

 sisting normally of one carpel 

 with 2 styles, and 3 stamens 

 (exceptionally 2-6), without 

 any perianth. On this view 

 the lodicules are bracteoles, en- 

 closed in a second pair — the 

 pale, and the flowering glume 



Another view regards the lodi- 



FlG. 345. — Diagram of a spikelet 

 of Wheat dissected ( x about S), 

 showing — from helow upwards 

 — the 2 barren glumes, the 

 flowering glume (right) and pale 

 (left), 2 lodicules, 3 stamens, 

 and the pistil. 



cules as representing two mem- 

 bers of a perianth. The " awn," 

 which is sometimes present, stands to the palea in the 

 relation of a leaf-blade to its sheath. 



Hildebrand thinks ^ that while the awns in 

 some cases promote dispersal, because their roughness 

 enables them to attach themselves to animals, their 

 principal use is that they move the seeds by hygroscopic 

 changes, and by serving as wings. No doubt they are 



' H. Marshall Ward has recently published a small but very useful book 

 on the family. Grasses (Cambridge Nat. Sci. Manual). See also Lowe, 

 British Grasses. 



2 £ot. Zeit. 1872, p. 890. 



