ME. G. BENTHAM ON &BAMINEJ3. 69 



tata, Sibth. {B. Sandorii, Friwaldsk.), a species striking for tte 

 long spikes, occasionally thougb very rarely branched at the base, 

 and from the rather large spikelets with acuminate outer glumes 

 showing an approach to some Vossice, but scarcely sufficiently 

 distinct from Botthoellia to be kept up as an independent genus. 

 Gymbaolvne, Eetz, a Bengal grass, has been referred by Willdenow 

 to JRotiboellia. Eetz's character does not quite agree ; but the 

 plant has not since been identified, and must remain doubtful. 

 Apogonia, Pourn., comprises two Mexican species which I am 

 unable to distinguish from JRotiboellia : Nuttall's section Apogonia 

 of Rottloellia is a species of Ulionurus, very closely allied to, if 

 not a variety of, E. ciliaris, H. B. K. 



13. OpHirEra. This genus, as first proposed by Gsertner, in- 

 eluded two very different plants separated by Brown as Leptttrus 

 and OpMurus. As the latter is now limited, it diifers from Sotf- 

 hoellia only in the absence of the second sterile spikelet of each 

 node, at least in the upper part of the spike or inflorescence. It 

 consists of three, or perhaps four, Asiatic, African, or Australian 

 species : — O. corymhosa, GraBrtn. (O. cethiopica, Steud.), O. mono- 

 stachya, Presl (0. undulata, Nees), and O. Icevis (Rotiboellia Icevis, 

 Retz, R. perforata, Roxb.). The latter species is remarkable for 

 having the spikelets in the lower part of the inflorescence in pairs 

 at each node as in Hotthoellia, but the two of each pair separated 

 by a kind of partition dividing the cavity of the rhachis into two ; 

 it has therefore been raised to a genus by Kunth as Mnesithea 

 and by Nees as Thyridostachyum. G-enerally, however, in the 

 upper part, and sometimes in the whole inflorescence, the sterile 

 spikelet is wanting, as in Ophiurus, especially in the young 

 spike, for the upper or Ophiurus portion appears to fall away 

 very readily, leaving only the Mnesithea part persistent. Lepturus, 

 Br., is now classed in the tribe Hordeese. 



14, Eatzebtteqia, Kunth, a very elegant little flat-spiked 

 Burmese grass, and 15. Manistjeis, Linn., a common tropical 

 weed with little globular spikelets, have both been well described 

 and figured. 



16. Hemaetheia, Br., contains two or three tropical weeds or 

 maritime grasses, separated from Rotthoellia chiefly on account of 

 the flattened and less distinctly articulated rhachis of the spike, 

 and the curious way in which the stipes of the sterile spikelet is 

 adnate to the rhachis, so as to make it appear sessile and almost 

 opposite to a fertile spikelet, which really belongs to the next 



