GRAMINEAE 71 



Abundant in some fish ponds in salt water, entirely submerged, near 

 Paraiiaque, ip places quite covering the bottom; Ceylon and Borneo. 



5. THALASSIA Solander 



Submerged herbs growing in salt water, the rootstock slender, creeping, 

 marked with annulate rings. Leaves in pairs or fascicles at the nodes of 

 the rootstock, flat, linear, thin or coriaceous, arising from the axil of a 

 membranaceous sheath. Flowers monoecious, solitary, in a' 2-valved spathe. 

 Male flowers with 3 petaloid sepals, the petals none. Stamens 6. Rudi- 

 mentary ovary none. Spathe with its valves connate .at the top. Female 

 flowers: Ovary 1-celled; ovules many. Spathe caducous. Fruit stipitate, 

 globose, smooth, rugose, or echinate, coriaceous, 6-valved, the valves persis- 

 tant, spreading. (Greek "of the sea.") 



Species 2, tropical shores of both hemispheres, 1 in the Philippines. 



1. T. hemprlchil (Ehrenb.) Aschers. 



Rootstock 2 to 3 mm in diameter, rather closely annulate. The young 

 shoots covered with hyaline sheaths. Leaves green, coriaceous when fresh, 

 membranaceous when dry, 3 to 20 cm long, 8 to 10 mm wide, somewhat 

 falcate, tip rounded, 2 to 5 in each fascicle. Fruit softly echinate. 



Shallow water of Manila Bay, occasionally washed up on the beach at 

 Pasay. Of local occurrence in the Philippines. Red Sea through the 

 Indian Ocean to Polynesia. 



13. GRAMINEAE ' (Grass or Zacate Family) 



Slender or coarse, annual or perennial plants of various habit, or in one 

 tribe, the' bamboos, woody and tree-like. Stems jointed, terete or com- 

 pressed ; internodes usually hollow, sometimes solid. Leaves simple, usually 

 long and narrow, entire, parallel-veined, the sheathing portion distinct frond 

 the blade, split down one side. Inflorescence various, of few to many spike- 

 lets in panicles, racemes, spikes, or heads, the spikelets composed of 2 to 

 many, 2-ranked, imbricated scales (glumes'), the lowest ones normally 

 empty, sometimes wanting, one or more of the upper glumes containing a 

 flower enclosed by the bract-like palea. Flowers perfect or starainate, 

 sometimes monoecious or dioecious. Stamens 1 to 6, usually 3. Ovary 

 1-celled, 1-ovuled. Fruit a seed-like grain (caryopsis). 



Genera about 345, species over 4,000, in all parts of the world, about 75 

 genera and 225 species known from the Philippines. 



1. Spikelets 1-, rarely 2-flowered, falling from the pedicel entire or with 

 certain joints of tl^e rachis, the rachilla not produced. 

 2. Spikelets cylindric or somewhat dorsally compressed; empty glumes 

 manifest. 

 3. Flowering glume and palea hyaline, much more delicate in texture 

 than are the empty glumes. 

 4. Spikelets unisexual, on separate inflorescences or on different 

 parts of the same inflorescence. ( Tribe Maydeae. ) 

 5. Staminate and pistillate inflorescences on different parts of the 

 same plant , - -- 1. Zea 



'For the grasses of the entire Archipelago see Merrill, E. D., "An 

 Enumeration of Philippine Gramineae with -Keys to the Genera and 

 species." Philip. J oum. Sel t (1906) Suppl. 307-391. 



