PLATE 496. 



LoLiUM iiULTiFLORUM, Lam. (Fl. Cap., Yol. YII, p. 739), 



ISTat. Order Gramineai. 



Annual. — Culms fascicled, geniculate ascending or erect, 1 J to 3 feet long, 

 glabrous, smooth or slightly rough in the upper part, 4-5-noded, internodes at length 

 more or less exserted, simple or branched below. 



Leaves glabrous ; sheaths striate, smooth, lower sometimes purplish ; Hgule 

 very short, truncate from an auricled base ; blades linear, long tapering to a very 

 slender point, 4 to 8 inches, by 1 to 2J lines, flat, somewhat rigid, scabrid on the 

 upper side and along the margins ; spikes erect, ^ to 1 foot long, of numerous (12 

 to 30) spikelets ; axis rather slender, smooth except at the scabrid margins ; inter- 

 nodes (except the lowest) distinctly shorter than the spikelets. 



Sbikelets strongly compressed from the side, elliptic-oblong, 6 to 8 lines long, 

 obliquely erect, 9 to 11 flowered, uppermost floret long exserted from the glume. 



Glumes, upper narrow, oblong, subobtuse, somewhat rounded on the back, 

 equalling the contiguous floret or nearly so, strongly 7 -nerved. Valves awned or 

 muticous, oblong, 2J to 3 lines long, subherbaceous-chartaceous, light green or tinged 

 with purple above, 5 -nerved, smooth ; awn (when present) straight. Very fine, 2| to 

 4 lines long, close to the short hyaline minutely 2 -toothed tip ; keels of pales green, 

 crested, scabrid ; anthers 1^ to 2 lines long ; grain linear-oblong, semiterete, IJ line 

 long, deeply channelled in front, adhering to valve and pale. 



Habitat : Natal. Polela, M. S. Evans, October, 1905 ; Government Herbarium, 

 10,772 ; also without precise locality, mixed with Buchanans No. 50, in Govern- 

 ment Herbarium, No. 10,773. 



Also in Cape Colony. A native of Central Europe and the Mediterranean 

 countries. 'Introduced in Natal and Cape Colony. 



Fig I, A spikelet ; 2, upper glume ; 3, valve ; 4, pale ; 5, pistil, stamens and lodicules. 

 All enlarged. 



