30 BRITISH SPECIES 
Festuca elatior, the Tall Fescue, is frequent in wet meadows and 
on the banks of streams throughout Britain. Very closely allied 
to F. pratensis and sometimes hardly distinguishable from it. 
Rootstock tufted, with stout stolons. Leaves large, broadly linear 
and tapering above, flat, firm, with prominent rough ribs and 
scabrid margins, dark green. Culms 2-3 ft. Panicle widely 
spreading, with paired branches, each bearing two or several 
spikelets which are $-? inch long and 5- or 6-flowered ; flowering 
glumes rounded on the back and tapered into a mucro, or very 
short awn. Perennial, flowering July and August, 
Glyceria aguatica, the Reedy Sweet-grass, grows in dense patches 
in, or at the margin of ponds and sluggish rivers, and in marshes ; 
rather common in England, rare in Scotland and Ireland. Root- 
stock very stout and extensively creeping. Leaves 2-3 ft. long and 
nearly an inch broad, linear and 
suddenly pointed, stiff and erect, 
speckled in transmitted light ; 
ligule short and truncate. Culms 
4-6 ft. Panicle large, much 
branched and _ spreading, the 
branches unequal, and many at 
each insertion. Spikelets numer- 
ous, 4 inch long, compressed, 
brownish, 5- to 10-flowered; glumes 
rounded on the back, obtuse, awn- 
less, the flowering ones 7-nerved. 
Perennial, flowering in August. 
Phragmites communis, the Com- 
mon Reed (fig. 38), forms thickets by 
the margins of lakes and in 
marshes; widely distributed 
throughout Britain, and abundant 
putt 2h —Calalrera: apeeticesooper in manly parts, motably the Fen 
fue a flower ih de plaiie add palea. district. Rootstock thick, jointed, 
and extensively creeping. Leaves 
large, broadly linear-lanceolate, striated ; ligule a circle of hairs. 
Culms 6-8 ft. The dense plumy panicle is at first purple, then brown, 
ultimately greyish- brown by reason of the copious growth of 
white hairs on the rachilla of the spikelets. Spikelets 4 inch long, 
3 to 5-flowered, the lowest flower staminate ; glumes awnless, the 
empty ones very unequal, the flowering ones subulate and en- 
veloped in the long silky hairs. Perennial, flowering middle of 
September in the north of England, earlier south. A depauper- 
ate form, A. 2Zgricians, is sometimes met with ; it is about half the 
size of the typical plant, and the spikelets are only I- or 2-flowered. 
' Catabrosa aquatica, the Water Whorl-grass (fig. 24), is rather 
thinly but widely distributed throughout Britain, in ponds and 
marshy places, and by the sides of streams. Rootstock with long 
creeping or floating branches which root at the lower nodes. 
Leaves flat, broadly linear, obtuse, flaccid. Culms ascending to 
