55 



Arrhenatherum avenaceum, Beauvois. Lindley. E. B. ed. 2. 113. 

 Generally adopted by modern botanists. Holcus avenaceus, 

 Scopoli. E. B. 813. Loudon, Encycl. 860. Avena elatior, 

 Linnceus. 



One of the commoner British grasses, growing in most soils and 

 situations, but generally preferring the skirts of woods and thickets, 

 hedges, and other sheltered places, where its flowering-stems often 

 attain the height of three feet or more. It is, however, not unfre- 

 quent in meadows and open pastures. The root» are fibrous, but 

 the lowermost joints of the stems, near the ground, often enlarge 

 in the form of small bulbs or tubers ; and, in dry soils especially, 

 this peculiarity occasionally becomes so strikingly developed, that, 

 associated with a slight corresponding difference in habit, it has 

 been regarded significant of a separate species, A. bulbosum of 

 Lindley and others. In luxuriant specimens the panicle is some- 

 times more than a foot in length, but in exposed situations not 

 above six inches, or even shorter; the slender, nearly verticillate 

 branches expand when in flower, but ultimately close upward 

 against the rachis. Spikelets few, pale green, the bases of the glumes 

 more or less tinted with brown. The structure of the two flowers, 

 and the absence of stigmas in the lower one, together with the 

 characters of the glumes and palese, and the difference between the 

 awns of the latter in the barren and fertile flowers, are features of 

 the genus illustrated in the magnified figures. 



Perennial. Flowers in June and July. 



The habit or general aspect of this grass is more accordant with 

 that of an Oat than of one of the Soft Grasses, but in the structure 

 of the spikelets it more nearly resembles the latter, differing chiefly 

 in the position of the barren flower, a feature which I have never 

 found reversed. 



The herbage is very productive, and, when growing in natural 

 or permanent pastures among other grasses, cattle and sheep eat it 

 promiscuously, though it has been affirmed that they decline it 

 alone, and dislike hay in which it may be present in any large pro- 

 portion. Sinclair's remarks upon it are rather contradictory, but 

 certainly very little in favour of its agricultural capabilities. After 

 mentioning the -fact of its rapidity of growth, and the early and 

 plentiful supply of herbage which it yields in spring, properties 

 that would entitle it to a high rank among the grasses adapted for 

 alternate husbandry, he adds that it contains too large a proportion 

 of bitter Extractive and saline matters to warrant its cultivation, 

 without a considerable admixture of other kinds. To me it appears 

 .that a grass so circumstanced is unworthy of the farmer's atten- 

 tion, especially when associated with a habit that renders its intro- 

 duction in alternate cropping highly unsatisfactory, namely the 

 difficulty of extirpation when no longer wanted. In accordance 



