KcELERiA, Pees. 



Spikelets laterally compressed in spike-like panicles ; rhachilla glabrous or 

 finely hairy, disarticulating above the glumes and between the valves, produced 

 with or without a rudimentary valve. Florets 1-5, perfect, or the uppermost more 

 or less reduced. Glumes 2, persistent, subequal or unequal, subacute to acuminate, 

 keeled, the lower usually l-nerved or like the upper 3-nerved, margins hyaline. 

 Valves exceeding the glumes, acute or obtuse with the margins and tips broadly 

 hyaline, 3-5-nerved ; side nerves usually faint, conniving above, middle nerve per- 

 current or excurrent into a mucro or a short subterminal awn ; callus very minute, 

 glabrous. Pales shorter than the valves or almost as long, 2-keeled, 2-toothed, 

 conspicuously hyaline and white. Lodicules 2, hyaline. Stamens 3. Ovary 

 glabrous; styles distinct, very short, stigmas laterally exserted, plumose. Grain 

 oblong, laterally compressed, whitish, soft, tightly embraced by the hardened back 

 of the valve ; hilum basal, short, obscure ; embryo small. 



Perennial or Annual. — Blades usually very narrow ; ligules hyaline. 

 Panicle usually cylindric, often interrupted, - glabrous and glistening from the 

 hyaline white margins of the valves and pales, or more or less hairy. 



Species 12 to 15, mainly in Europe, North Africa, and temperate Asia, one 

 species almost cosmopolitan. 



PLATE 189. 



KcELERiA CRISTATA, Pers. (Fl. Cap., Vol. VII., p. 468). 



Nat. Order Graminese. 



Perennial, densely csespitose. — Culms erect, rarely geniculately ascending, 6 

 inches to more than 1 foot long, glabrous or villous, pubescent, 1-2-noded, upper 

 internodes very long, exserted. 



Leaves crowded near the base ; sheaths rather tight, striate, glabrous or 

 pubescent to villous, the loiver more or less persistent ; ligule obtuse, minutely 

 ciliolate, rarely more than ^ line long, usually produced into lateral auricles ; 

 blades linear, acute, from 1 inch to 1 foot long, to ] line broad, flat, soft and even 

 flaccid, or setaceously convolute and flexuous or rigid, glabrous and smooth below, 

 pubescent above, or ciliate, or pubescent to villous all over. 



Panicle cylindric, often interrupted or lobed, 1 to 4 inches, by 2^ to 6 lines, 

 dense ; branches repeatedly and very shortly branched from the base, like the 

 rhachis pubescent to minutely villous ; pedicels very short. 



Spikelets 2 to 2^ lines long, 2-3-flowered. 



Glumes glabrous or pubescent, the lower narrow, lanceolate, subacute to acute, 

 1;^ to If line long, l-nerved, the upper much broader, subacute to acutely acuminate, 

 1^ to 2J lines long, 3-nerved. Valves oblong to lanceolate in profile, subobtuse to 

 acuminate, sometimes mucronulate, if to 2 lines long, glabrous or pubescent ; 

 lodicules 2-3-lobed or toothed ; anthers f to 1 line long ; grain up to 1^ line long. 



5ai&iiat; Natal. Buchanan 95, 157; Van Reenen, 5000-6000 feet alt., 

 December, Wood 7215a. 



Baron F. v. Mueller says of this grass : " Widely dispersed over the globe, 

 A perennial grass of fair nutritive quality, sustains itself on dry soil." Another 

 authority says : " Of no agricultural value, and rejected by cattle." 



Fig 1, Spikelet with glumes removed; 2, lower glume; 3, upper glume; 4, valve; 5, 

 pale; 6, stamens and lodicules. All enlarged. 



