EnieropO0on.'] ClXXIiI. oSaMNE^. (J. D. Hooker.) 285 



Stems 1-3 ft., densely tufted, wiry. Leaves nearly as long as the stem, up to 

 i in. broad, flat or convolute, tip capillary ; ligule of long hairs. Spihes 6-10 in., 

 liexuouB or carved, raohis dorsally rounded. Spikelets ^-^ in., loosely imbricate, 

 larely 2-Beriate j gls. I and 11 glistening; III opaque, with a very thick raised 

 midrib ; awn about = the gl. 



87. TRXPOeON, Both. 



Slender densely tufted grasses. Leaves usually convolute. Spikelets 

 mauy-fld.. (fl. all but 1-2 terminal perfect), 2-3eriate and unilateral on a 

 very slender terminal spike, not jointed at the base ; rachilla produced 

 between the glumes, jointed at the base. Olumes many, I and II unequal, 

 distantly superposed, l-nerved, empty, persistent; I usually lodged in a 

 furrow of the raohis, and toothed or lobed on one side ; II entire or notched 

 below the mucronate or apiculate tip ; III and following ovate, dorsally 

 convex, 2-fid, and awned in the cleft, or 4-Sd with the outer lobes awned, 

 the inner membranous and rarely awned ; palea broad or narrow, com- 

 plicate. Lodicules 2. Stamens 3. Styles very short. Grain very narrow, 

 free. — Species about 10, trop. and subtrop. Asia and Africa. 



The species of Tripoffon are very closely allied, and though dissimilar in many 

 respects, are so variable in all, that they form an almost inextricable plexus. The 

 most distinct are T. capillatus, pauperculus, WightU, and abyssinicus, of which the 

 latter almost passes into Jacquemontii. Glume I is remarkable from being in most 

 species insequilateral, one margin being deeply notched, or dilated suddenly below 

 the middle into a wing or lobe or segment, which is sometimes displaced and appears 

 as a small 3rd or lowest empty glume. The subcqual symmetrical glumes of T. 

 poMperculus and Wightii are unusual in the genus. — The length of the awns, and of 

 the lobes of the gl. Ill vary in each species; and there is every intermediate between 

 the species with two simple awned lobes one on each side of the median awn, as in 

 T. trifidus, and the quadrifid top of the gl. of T, filiformis. — The species grow 

 promiscuously on rocks or trunks of trees. 



* Pig. glumes simply 2-fid with an interposed awn, the lobes awned or 

 not. 



t Awn as long or longer than its glume. 



1. T. capillatus, Jauh. Sf Spach. lllustr. Fl. Orient, iv. 47, t. 332 ; gl. 

 I and II narrowly lanceolate acuminate or awned, III villous at the base, 

 awn many times longer than its gl. flexuous. T. capitatus (err. typ.) 

 Lisloa in Jowrn. Bomb. Nat. Hist. Soc. vii. (1893) 371. 



Behar ; on Parusnath, J. D. B., Clarice. Westebn Ghats j from the Concan to 

 the Nilghiri Hills, Jaequemont, &c. 



Stem very slender. Leaves 6-10 in., convolute. Spilce 6-12 in., filiform or 

 capillary, flexuous. Spikelets remote, yVs- i°'> *'ew-fld., green; gl. I sometimes very 

 ininate, at others nearly as long as II, both sometimes awned, membranous with a 

 broad defined nerve ; lateral teeth of III shortly awned ; median awn so slender as to 

 be barely visible. 



2. T. pauperculus, Stapf in Hook. Ic. Fl. t. 2442 ; dwarf, stems 

 capillary, gl. I and II lanceolate subaristately acuminate symmetrical, 

 III villous at the base, lateral lobes long-awned median-awn not twice as 

 long as the gl. 



Westebn Ghats ; near Poona, on stems of trees, Woodrow. 



Stems 2-3 in., densely tufted, leafy to the tip. Leaves sttaceous, im-olute, upper 



