60 



-crab grasses are at home in the South. They not only live, but live in spite of neg- 

 lect, and when petted and encouraged they make such grateful returns as astonish 

 *the benefactor. 



Professor Killebrew, of Tennessee, says : 



In Louisiana, Texas, and the South generally it is and has been the chief reliance 

 for pasture for a long time, and the immense herds of cattle on the Southern prairies 

 -subsist principally on this food. It revels in sandy soils, and has been grown ex- 

 -tensively on the sandy hills of Virginia and North and South Carolina. It is used 

 -extensively on the Southern rivers to hold the levees and embankments of the roads. 

 It will throw its runners over a rock six feet across, and soon hide it from view, or it 

 will run down the sides of the deepest gully and stop its washing. Hogs thrive upon 

 its succulent roots, and horses and cattle upon its foliage. It has the capacity to 

 withstand any amount of heat and drought, and months that are so dry as to check 

 the growth of blue grass will only make the Burmuda green and the more thrifty. 



Professor Phares, of Mississippi, says : 



As a permanent pasture grass, I know of no other that I consider so valuable as this, 

 after having transferred it from near the mouth of the Red River to my present resi- 

 dence, thirty-five years ago, and having studied it on hundreds of other farms, com- 

 mons, and levees for a longer period. To make good hay and the largest yield this 

 .grass must be mowed from three to five times every summer Thus briers, broom 

 .grass, and other weeds are repressed and prevented from seeding, multiplying, and 

 .ruining the meadow. • 



Ctenidm, Panz. 



Spikelets densely imbricated in two rows on one side of the rhachis 

 •of the usually solitary terminal spike, elegantly pectinate, with one 

 perfect and one or more imperfect or neutral flowers ; outer glumes 

 very unequal, the lower small, the upper large and bearing on the 

 middle of the back a recurved awn tuberculate at the base ; usually 

 only one of the flowering glumes has a palet ; glumes of the perfect 

 a.nd lower imperfect ones are mucronate or aristate at the apex, the 

 upper imperfect ones awn less. 

 1. C. Americanum, Spreng. Southern States. 



Chloeis, Swz. 



Spikelets crowded in two rows on one. side of simple spikes which 

 are digitate or fasciculate at the summit of the culm ; one (the lower) 

 perfect, and one to several imperfect flowers in each spikelet ; outer 

 glumes thin, keeled, awnless; flowering glumes of thicker texture, 

 obtuse, usually awned, sometimes truncate and obtuse; palet folded, 

 with two prominent nerves. 



1. C. cucullata, Bisch. Texas aud Arkansas. 



2. C. elegans, JET. B. K. (C. alba, Presl.) Texas to Mexico. 



