64 



ered, the upper flower imperfect or rudimentary ; the outer glumes 

 are membranaceous, shorter than the flowers, the flowering glumes' 

 usually obtuse ; the palet folded and two-keeled. 

 Professor Phares, of Mississippi, says : 



The clumps have many long leaves and stems, rising 1 or 2 feet high, and many- 

 long, strong, deeply penetrating fibrous roots. It grows readily in door-yards, barn- 

 yards, and rich cultivated grounds, and produces an immense quantity of seeds. It 

 is a very nutritious grass, and good for grazing, soiling, and hay. The succulent 

 lower part of the stems, covered with the sheaths of the leaves, renders it difficult to 

 cure well, for which several days are required. It may be cut two or three times, 

 and yields a large quantity of hay. 



2. E. iEgyptiaca, Pers. (Dactylotsenium, Gaert.) Introduced. 



Crowfoot. 



3. E. Barcinomensis, Costa. Introduced on Ballast. 



Leptochloa, Beauv. 



Spikelets several (rarely one) flowered, perfect, sessile in two rows 

 along one side of the slender, usually numerous spikes or branches 

 of the panicle; outer glumes keeled, obtuse or acute, awnless, or 

 mueronate ; flowering glumes usually obtuse, prominently nerved, 

 awnless ; palet prominently two-nerved. 



1. L. Langloisii, Vasey. Louisiana. 



2. L. mucronata, Kth. Throughout the West. 



3. L. Nealleyi, Vasey. Texas. 



Buchlob, Engelm. 



Spikelets dioecious, or rarely monoecious, heteromorphous. 



Male plant. — Spikelets two or three flowered in short one-sided 

 two-ranked spikes, of which there are two or three at the summit of 

 the culm; spikes four to five lines long, composed of five or six 

 closely approximated spikelets ; outer glumes unequal, one-nerved, 

 the lower one half as long as the flower above it, the upper shorter ; 

 flowering glumes and palets of equal length, membranaceous, the 

 flowering glume three-nerved, the palet two-nerved. 



Female plant. — Spikelets closely approximated in short capitate 

 spikes, which are mostly near the ground, and partly inclosed in the 

 bract-like sheaths of the upper leaves ; spikelets one-flowered, all the 

 upper glumes indurated and cohering at their bases with the thick- 

 ened rachis, the lower glume of the lowest spikelet lanceolate with 

 an herbaceous tip, or two or three cleft, thickened and adnate to the 



