Eragrostis, Beauv. 



Spikelets usually strongly laterally compressed, pedicelled in open or con- 

 tracted panicles, rarely sessile in simple or compound spikes, very rarely articulate 

 on the pedicels ; rhachilla disarticulating above the glumes and between the valves 

 or tough and persistent, glabrous, sometimes more or less scaberulous ; very rarely 

 minutely hairy. Florets 2 to many, perfect or the uppermost reduced. 



Glumes unequal or equal, usually membranous, 1 -nerved, or the upper some- 

 times 3-nerved, keeled, persistent or deciduous. Valves more or less imbricate, 

 ovate to lanceolate, acute or obtuse, entire, muticous, membranous to chartaceous, 

 3-nerved, glabrous, very rarely minutely pubescent ; side-nerves short or almost 

 percurrent. Pales equal to the valves or sHghtly shorter, membranous, 2-keeled, 

 deciduous or persistent on the rhachilla. Lodicules 2, small, cuneate, more or less 

 fleshy. Stamens 3, rarely 2. Ovary glabrous ; styles distinct ; stigmas plumose, 

 laterally exserted. Grain enclosed by the scarcely altered valve and pale and 

 deciduous vpith them, or more commonly falling, with the deciduous valve, leaving 

 the more or less persistent pale behind, oblong to obovoid or globose, round or very 

 obtusely triquetrous or quadrangular in cross section ; pericarp thin, sometimes 

 slightly swelling or separating ; embryo often ^ as long as the grain (or sometimes 

 longer) ; hilum punctiform, basal. 



Perennial or Annual, of very varying habit ; blades narrow ; ligule reduced 

 to a fringe of usually minute hairs ; panicles lax to effuse or contracted to S23ike-like, 

 or transformed into simple or compound spikes ; spikelets usually more or less olive- 

 green or olive-grey, breaking up variously, very rarely deciduous as a whole 



Species very numerous in the warm parts of the world. 



PLATE 41S. 



Eragrostis c^sia, Stapf (Fl. Cap., Vol. Vll., p. 5!)9). 

 Nat. Order Graminese. 



Perennial, densely tufted. — Culms erect, slender, compressed, simple, f to Ij 

 foot long, glabrous, smooth, 1-noded, at or below the middle, internodes shortly 

 exserted, or both or the upper alone enclosed ; loiver sheaths crowded, almost 

 flabellate, strongly compressed and keeled, often pinkish with white margins, upper 

 tight or widening upwards, all quite glabrous and smooth except at the scantily 

 bearded mouth ; ligule a fringe of minute hairs ; blades tightly convolute, finely 

 setaceous, 3 to 10 inches long, flexuous, rather firm, glabrous, smooth. 



Panicle nodding, contracted, more or less linear, 3 to 8 inches long ; axis filiform, 

 smooth ; branches solitary, rather distant, lowest often enclosed at the base in the 

 uppermost sheath, finely fihform, compressed, smooth, divided from the base or some 

 distance above it; branchlets distant, simply racemose or the lower again divided and 

 then up to | inch long, usually adpressed to the branches ; pedicels short to very short. 



Spikelets rather crowded, lanceolate, acute, 2J to 5|- lines by 1 line, grey, 

 closely 3 to 5-flowered, rhachilla disarticulating, smooth. 



Glumes unequal, deciduous, linear-oblong in profile, acute or subobtuse, sub- 

 hyaline,^ 1-nerved or (particularly the lower) nerveless, lower | to ^ line long, upper 

 over 1 line long. Valves lanceolate, acute or sometimes mucronulate, Ij to l| line 

 long, thin, smooth except on the scaberulous acute keels. Pales 1 line long, keels 

 narrowly winged, scaberulous Anthers | line long. 



E&bitSit : Natal. Eiet Vley, 4000 to 5000 feet alt., Buchanan 240. 

 Drawn from Buchanan's specimen. 



Fig 1, Lower glume ; 2, upper glume ; 3, valve ; 4, pale ; 5, stamens, pistil and lodicules. 

 All enlarged. 



