TWO PROMINENT SOUTHERN GRASSES 127 
fully planted in the Bethune garden. From this it 
soon spread to the streets of the village. The embargo 
act is therefore probably responsible for the intro- 
duction of Bermuda grass into this country by making 
it necessary to secure foreign merchandise through the 
West Indies. There is no evidence to show that it 
came from the Bermuda Islands. 
This grass has now spread northward to Maryland 
and westward to the Pacific Coast, and is nearly as 
common throughout the South as blue-grass is in the 
North. It is, in many respects, the Southern counter- 
part of blue-grass, and is, beyond question, the best pas- 
ture-grass in the South, and one of the best in the 
world. Like blue-grass, it is also the universal lawn 
grass of the section over which it has spread. It is 
distinctly a Southern grass, and revels in the hottest 
parts of the long Southern summer. Even in the ex- 
treme South it is not a shade-loving plant, but prefers 
the direct rays of the sun. It is not an uncommon 
thing to see Bermuda grass lawns with spots on the 
shady side of trees and shrubbery in which the ground 
is bare or occupied’ with more shade-loving plants, such 
as white clover. . 
Unlike blue-grass, Bermuda grass looks brown and 
dead during the winter season, and does not begin to 
‘‘ green out’’ till rather late in spring. In the lati- 
tude of Washington City it does not begin to throw 
out green leaves till May. Its color is a light green, 
not nearly so attractive as the richer green of blue- 
grass. For these two reasons it is not an ideal lawn 
grass. Nevertheless, a well-kept Bermuda lawn in the 
Southern States is decidedly beautiful during summer. 
