Aristida, Linn. 



Spikelets 1-flovvered, narrow, panicled, rhachilla disarticulating above the 

 glume, not. produced. Glumes usually persistent, narrow, l-3-nerved, muticous or 

 mucronate, awnless. Valve convolute, cylindric or oblong-cylindric, 3-nerved, 

 awned, rather rigid, tips gradually tapering or minutely bilobed, sometimes jointed 

 at or above the middle ; callus villous, shortly bearded, usually pungent ; awn 

 nearly always 3-partite from the base or above the simple base (stipitate) very 

 rarely simple, continuous with the valve or disarticulating from it or deciduous with 

 a portion of the valve, foot straight or twisted, bristles plumose or the lateral or all 

 naked. Pale small oblong, 2-nerved or nerveless. Lodicules 2, finely nerved. 

 Stamens 3. Ovary glabrous ; styles distinct, short ; stigmas plumose, laterally 

 oxserted. Grain slender, cylindric or oblong-cylindric, terete, sometimes grooved, 

 tightly embraced by the valve ; hilum linear, almost as long as the grain ; embryo 

 short or long. 



Annual or more often perennial, tufted, usually with more or less wiry culms ; 

 blades narrow, usually convolute ; ligule usually a line of very short hairs ; panicle 

 varying from spike-like to effuse. 



Numerous species in the dry and warm regions of both hemispheres. 



PLATE 197. 



Aristida ^qtjiglumis, Hack. (Fl. Cap., Vol. VII., p. 555). 

 Nat. Order Graminese. 



Perennial, densely ca3spitose, glabrous. 



Culms very slender, terete, erect, simple, wiry, I to 1^ foot long, smooth, 

 about 3-4-noded, internodes exserted ; sheaths very tight throughout, smooth ; 

 ligule a minutely ciliolate rim. 



Blades setaceously convolute, fine, 2 to 4 inches long, firm, strongly curved, 

 smooth below, minutely puberulous on the upper surface, margins scabrid. 



Panicle linear-oblong, contracted, or somewhat open and lax, 3 to 4 inches 

 long ; rhachis filiform, smooth or subscaberulous ; branches remotely 2 or 3-nate, 

 or the upper solitary, erect or oblique, longest up to more than 2 inches long and 

 sparsely divided from the middle, the others almost simple, subcapillary, scaberulous ; 

 branches 1 to 3 spiculate ; lateral pedicels very short. 



Spikelets straw-coloured or tinged with purple, 4 to 5 lines long. 



Glumes equal or subequal, lanceolate-linear, shortly mucronate from the 

 minutely 2-toothed tips, 1-nerved. Valve linear-convolute, 3.^ lines long, produced 

 into an often slightly exserted and more or less twisted almost solid scabrid beak, 

 minutely scaberulous below it, violet ; awns continuous with the valve, capillary, 

 suberect, scaberulous, about 10 to 15 lines long ; pale oblong, acute, slightly over 

 J line long ; lodicules about as long as the pale. 



Eabitat: Natal. Near Maritzburg, T. J. St. George No. 10 {Wood 7232). 



In the Flora Capensis, Natal is not credited with this species, Transvaal 

 localities only being quoted. 



Fig 1, Glume; 2, valve; 3, pale; 4, pistil, stamens and lodicules; 5, anther. All 

 enlarged. 



