134 



afterwards rectified by Sir J. E. Smitli, who named it A. alpina. It 

 is a much taller and stouter plant than A. pratensis in its ordinary 

 form, with longer and broader leaves, and larger spikelets. Stems 

 two or three feet high. Leaves flat, broadly linear, acuminate. Inflo- 

 rescence more compact than that of the preceding, with shorter and 

 thicker peduncles, which are usually simple. Spikelets erect, variable 

 in the number of their flowers, but seldom having fewer than four 

 perfect ones, which are all awned. 



Perennial. Flowers in July. 



There is really no structural distinction between this and Avena 

 pratensis, but, owing to the more exaggerated development of the 

 present, the habit or general aspect differs so greatly as to render the 

 resemblance between them difficult of recognition by the more general 

 observer, to whom our figure may therefore prove valuable. 



Avena planiculmis. Flat-stemmed Oat Grass. Plate CXV. 



Panicle erect, compound, interruptedly verticiUate ; branches short. 

 Spikelets much longer than the glumes, clustered, erect, sub-cylindrical, 

 linear-oblong, five- to seven-flowered. Leaves scabrous, broadly linear, 

 suddenly acute, minutely serrated. Sheaths flattened, sharply cari- 

 nated, scabrous. Lower part of the culm slightly compressed, two- 

 edged. 



Avena planiculmis. Schroder, Fl. germ. HooJcer, Brit. Flora, (not 

 of English Botany, see A. alpina). E. B. Supp., 2684. E. B. ed. 

 2. 165.* Hooker and Arnott. Avena latifolia. Host, Gram. 

 Austr. Trisetum pratense, var., latifolium, Barnell. A. pratense 

 var., Bdbington. 



First published as a British plant in the Supplement to the English 

 Botany, 2684, on the authority of Sir W. J. Hooker ; having been 

 then recently discovered by Mr. Stuart Murray, at Glen Sannox, on 

 the ascent of Goat-fell, from Loch Rannock, in the Isle of Arran, 

 Scotland. Our figure and description are both taken from the work 

 above named. It grows in tufts, with stems from one to two feet high 

 in the wild state, but attaining in a garden the height of three feet. 

 The stems are slightly compressed at the lower part, being there 

 covered with the long, roughly pubescent, remarkably compressed, 

 and ancipitate sheaths of the leaves. The lower leaves are almost a 

 foot in length, those of the culm very short ; but all of them broad, 

 linear, acute, deep-green, rough on both sides, and especially so on the 

 margins. Ligule oblong, smooth. Panicle with many short, sub- 

 vertioiUate branches. Spikelets nearly an inch long, broadly linear. 

 Outer palea purplish-green, diaphanous at the extremity, having a 

 twisted awn inserted above the middle of the back. At the base of 

 each flower is a short tuft of hairs. 



It appears, that, cultivated in the Glasgow Botanic Garden, from 

 roots brought there by Mr. Murray in 1826, it preserves all its 



