“IX 
TWO PROMINENT SOUTHERN GRASSES 
BERMUDA GRASS (Cynodon dactylon) 
HIS grass, known in the Southern States as Ber- 
muda (universally pronounced ‘‘Bermooda’’), 
in India as ‘‘doob,’’ and in the British West 
Indies as ‘‘scutch-grass’’ (Fig. 24), is dis- 
tributed throughout tropical and subtropical regions 
of both hemispheres. It is'the great pasture-grass of 
subtropical and warm temperate regions throughout 
the world. (The localities where Bermuda grass is im- 
portant are indicated in Fig. 25.) 
So far as known, the following incident was the first 
introduction of this grass into the United States. Mr. 
James A. Bethune, of Washington, D. C., states that 
during the war of 1812 Mr. John G. Winter, a mer- 
chant of Greensboro, Georgia, compelled by the block- 
ade of the Atlantic seaports to bring his merchandise 
in through St. Mary’s, on the Georgia-Florida line, on 
one occasion threw into the street in front of his store 
some grass in which a shipment of crockery had been 
packed. The late Gen. James N. Bethune, then a lad 
of nine or ten years of age, living in Greensboro, 
picked up a sprig of the curious-looking grass and car- 
. ried it to his mother. Good grasses being much 
needed in that section at that time, the sprig was care- 
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